What Dreams May Come
by brihana25
Summary: While exploring a seemingly uninhabited planet, Daniel falls victim to a Goa'uld trap. How far are Jack and SG-1 willing to go to get him back? Gen. COMPLETE
1. Chapter 1

**TITLE:** What Dreams May Come  
**AUTHOR:** brihana25  
**CATEGORY:** H/C, Drama, Friendship  
**SPOILERS:** a few for Thor's Hammer and Torment of Tantalus; huge, huge, massive ones for Fire and Water; one little bitty one for Hathor  
**SEASON:** One (takes place between Fire and Water and Hathor)  
**RATING:** R  
**DISCLAIMER:** Stargate SG1, its characters and situations, are copyright MGM, Greenburg/Anderson, Gekko, Top Secret, and Kawoosh! No infringement on, or challenge to, their status is intended. This piece of fiction was written strictly for the entertainment of other fans, and I am gaining no form of compensation for it.  
**MORE DISCLAIMERS:** This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or actual places and locations, is purely coincidental.

Criticism and feedback of all kinds is welcome, but constructive criticism and common courtesy will get you farther than flames will.

**AUTHOR'S NOTES:** My everlasting, unending, enduring gratitude to Ms. 3M, LadyGrey, Tiv'ester and Gategrrl for their truly amazing insight, proofreading, and editing. If you think this is good, thank them. If you think it sucks, blame me. :)

My most sincere thanks to Annie, both for taking a chance and publishing this for me and for being kind enough to allow me to post it here now.

**SUMMARY:** While exploring a seemingly uninhabited planet, Daniel falls victim to a Goa'uld trap. How far are Jack and SG-1 willing to go to get him back?

- - -  
Chapter One  
- - -

"Daniel?"

_The end of his search, and yet only the beginning. He'd found the way to save her; all he had to do was find her. He needed only to bring her to this place. She would be with him again. This time, forever would last for an eternity._

_But his only hope of saving her had been destroyed as suddenly as it had been discovered. The most painful blow was the knowledge that the destruction had been done by his own hand._

"Daniel!"

_The secrets of the universe swirled above his head—the undeniable truth of their existence. Four great races communicating with each other on a level that, while so elegantly simple, was so far beyond his comprehension. Spinning and dipping, they taunted and teased him. They filled his mind and would have stolen his life, but his sacrifice would have brought understanding. A universe of mystery waited to be deciphered, willing to reveal itself only to him. He had only to stay, to watch … and he would learn._

_But he had turned his back and walked away. Their legacy crumbled into oblivion and took his hope with it._

"Earth to Dr. Jackson? Come in, Dr. Jackson."

_Centuries of pain, uncertainty and fear, tempered by love, came crashing down with one word of truth. After thousands of years spent searching for answers, the one that was received was the only one that hadn't been wanted. The love of his life, his only reason for living, would never return to him._

_But what if she did? _

_He could have taken her to the Hammer and driven the demon from her eyes, but he had destroyed it. He could have studied the writings at Heliopolis and learned from them how to save her, but he had walked away and let them fall into the ocean._

"Daniel! For crying out loud, open this door!"

_He couldn't seem to get his thoughts in order anymore. Where did he end and Nem begin? Where did Earth and Oannes diverge? Were Sha're and Omaroca bound to the same fate? What had become of Belos?_

_Glowing eyes danced before him, eyes that stared back at him from his own face. A darkness hovered above the body that he had once called his own, and he watched in horror as the hand—his hand—reached out for them, his friends, his family. He saw the lightning flash from his own fingertips. He heard them cry out and watched them fall, one by one. There was nothing he could do to save them, nothing he could do to stop it. _

_His body moved and breathed, though he was no longer in it. He watched the scene through his own eyes, but not from behind them._

_He'd killed them! _

_What was happening to him? Why was he seeing these images of Jack, Sam and Teal'c lying dead at his feet? What had Nem done to his mind?_

_As his confusion grew he heard a pounding, a beating as if of his own heart. But it was too loud, too slow, and out of sync with the pounding he felt in his head. His mind swam, then filled, then exploded with pain._

"Oh, God!"

- - -

Jack and Teal'c stood in the corridor outside Daniel's quarters. They exchanged anxious glances when they heard the anguished cry. Jack stepped aside quickly and gestured for Teal'c to step forward. Teal'c lifted one foot and kicked; the door broke free of its lock and swung open. Jack was through it and on his way to Daniel's side before Teal'c's foot touched the floor again.

Daniel was sleeping—that much was immediately obvious. He was lying on a metal-framed bed, wearing a pair of fatigue pants and a black T-shirt, tossing his head back and forth. The muscles in his arms were taut, his legs flexed and straightened quickly, and his movements made it appear as though he was pulling against restraints that were holding him to the bed, but there was nothing there.

Jack crossed the room in seconds and knelt on the floor beside the bed. Teal'c followed close behind him but remained standing.

"Daniel!"

"I can't!" Daniel shook his head vigorously, his voice shaky and filled with pain. "I can't! God, it hurts!"

"Daniel, wake up!"

A strangled cry of, "I killed them!" was Daniel's only response.

Jack grasped Daniel's forearms and shook him. "Daniel!"

Daniel's eyes snapped open, wide and glassy with fear, and he gasped in a deep, quivering breath. Sweat matted his hair to his forehead and beaded on his upper lip. He closed his eyes, and shook his head slightly. When he opened his eyes again, the panic of his sudden awakening had been replaced by confusion.

"Hey, Jack. Teal'c." The soft words of greeting sounded groggy to Jack's ears. "Um … what's going on?"

Jack glanced up at Teal'c. "Actually, I was just about to ask you that."

"Huh?" Daniel's confusion was obviously growing, and he looked back and forth between Jack and Teal'c. "What do you mean? I was sleeping."

"Your sleep was greatly disturbed, Daniel Jackson," Teal'c said. "O'Neill and I heard you from the corridor. You were shouting as if in great pain."

Daniel lowered his eyebrows and frowned. "I wasn't shouting."

"Indeed you were," Teal'c protested.

Daniel opened his mouth to argue further, but Jack spoke first.

"A nightmare, Daniel," he explained with the hint of a grin. "You were having a nightmare."

"Oh." Daniel creased his forehead slightly in concentration. After a few seconds of silence, he closed his eyes and sighed. "Oh," he said again, his voice heavy with understanding.

Jack shifted his position on the floor to relieve the pressure on his knees and leaned forward. "You remember what it was about?" he asked.

"Yeah."

Jack glanced up at Teal'c once more before asking, "You wanna talk about it?"

Daniel opened his eyes and shook his head slightly. "Not really, no."

"Are you in pain, Daniel Jackson?"

Daniel blinked again. "Um … no. Not really. Just a headache. And … um …"

"And what?" Jack asked. He knew about the headache that had plagued Daniel since his return from Oannes. That Daniel not only didn't deny it but had actually accepted a prescription from Fraiser to combat it bothered him.

He remembered all-too-well the conversation he and Daniel had had two days earlier. Jack had asked why Nem was initially unwilling to submit Daniel to the memory device, and Daniel had shrugged and answered him very softly, "He said, 'It could damage.' "

"And what, Daniel?" Jack asked again. He felt his initial concern for Daniel's welfare escalating as worries about brain damage began to solidify in his mind, and he tightened his grip on Daniel's arms. "Is it worse than before? Do you know where you are? Do you remember your name?"

"What?" Daniel's eyebrows disappeared under his hair and he looked at Jack as though he had suddenly sprouted a second nose. "What are you talking about? Of course I know my name."

"So what is it?" Jack demanded.

"Daniel Jackson," Daniel answered with a hint of irritation. His forehead creased and his eyes narrowed in concern as he studied Jack's face. "Jack, are you okay?"

"I'm fine, Daniel," Jack answered quickly. "The question is—how are you?"

"Um …" Daniel turned his head slightly and looked up at Teal'c for an explanation of Jack's behavior. Teal'c didn't seem to have one to give him. Daniel turned back to Jack and said, very slowly, "I'm fine."

"Where are you?" Jack asked. He tightened his grip even more. "Do you remember how you got here?"

Daniel sighed in frustration and shook his head. "I'm in my lockdown quarters at the SGC. I'm on my bunk. I spent the morning studying the MALP images from P2A-759, typed up my report for General Hammond, and ate lunch. I didn't have anything else to do, and my head hurt, so I thought I'd catch a quick nap." He looked directly into Jack's eyes and his mouth twitched as he said, "It was quiet then."

"So what's the problem?" Jack asked. "What else is wrong?"

"Actually, Jack, my um, …" Daniel cleared his throat and continued almost reluctantly. "My arms hurt …"

Jack realized that Daniel had been squirming slightly throughout the entire conversation, almost as though he were trying to pull away. Jack's concern raised another notch and he tightened his grasp again.

"Why?"

"Because you're squeezing them too hard," Daniel replied through clenched teeth.

"Oh!" Jack released his grip immediately. He leaned away from the bunk and flashed a quick, guilty smile. "Sorry 'bout that."

"Are you well now, Daniel Jackson?" Teal'c asked with a slightly bemused expression on his face.

Daniel looked up at Teal'c and smiled. "I'm fine, Teal'c. Now that my arms aren't being ripped off …"

"Hey!" Jack protested. He raised his eyebrows, looked across at Daniel and subtly inspected him for any more signs of pain. Daniel's bright eyes and friendly smile put his mind at ease, and he teased back. "Ya know, I just might do that one of these days. Rip 'em off and beat you upside the head with 'em."

Daniel laughed lightly as he pushed himself into a sitting position on the bed.

"I do not understand the point of such an action, O'Neill. Would it not cause great harm to Daniel Jackson to do such a thing?"

Jack turned his head slowly and looked up at Teal'c. He raised his eyebrows in question, but Teal'c's face betrayed nothing. As usual, Jack was unable to tell whether or not Teal'c was joking. He shook his head slowly and turned back to Daniel. Daniel laughed again and leaned against the concrete wall the bed was pushed up against.

Jack smiled. "It might knock some sense into him, Teal'c," he said. He pushed himself to his feet without taking his eyes from Daniel's face. "Keep him from volunteering to have his brains scrambled in the future." He tipped his head and raised his eyebrows once more, making it clear with his expression that under no circumstances was Daniel to ever put them through that again.

Daniel shook his head and lowered his eyes to stare at his hands. He picked at the hem of his T-shirt absently. "Don't worry, Jack," he said. "I'm not planning to do it again."

"Well good!" Jack declared. He flopped heavily on the bunk next to his now-upright friend. "I like your brain just fine the way it is—scattered and all." Jack playfully smacked Daniel in the back of the head.

"Ow!" Daniel put a hand to the back of his head and shot Jack an irritated glare.

Jack leaned forward as the concern he'd felt earlier returned. "What?"

"Headache, Jack. Remember?"

Jack closed his eyes and let his head fall back, upset at his own forgetfulness. "Right! Sorry again."

Daniel looked back and forth between the two men. He tucked his hair behind his ears and picked his glasses up from the table at the foot of the bed. As he settled them into place on his face, he creased his eyebrows in confusion. "Hey, guys?"

"Yeah?"

"Why were you outside my room in the first place?"

Jack smiled up at Teal'c, whose eyes betrayed a possible hint of amusement. "You're late for the briefing, Daniel. Hammond and Carter are waiting for us. We came down to get you."

"Briefing?" Daniel looked at the ceiling as though the answer to his question was written there. "The briefing!"

Jack chuckled as Daniel launched himself from the bunk, grabbed an armful of not-quite-organized papers from a small table, and ran for the door. Jack pushed himself up more slowly and, he imagined, in a much more dignified manner.

"Would beating Daniel Jackson with his own arms unscatter his brain, O'Neill?"

Jack laughed and slapped Teal'c on the arm. "Probably not. I don't think there's enough alien technology in this galaxy to do that."

As they exited the room and Jack closed the door behind them, a disheveled head of long brown hair popped around the corner of the hallway. "Are you guys coming or not? We're late!"

- - -

"P2A-759," Daniel was saying as he rifled through the assortment of papers on the table in front of him. "Sa … Captain Carter and I both feel that this will be an excellent next assignment for SG-1, General."

"What do you feel is of value on this world, Dr. Jackson?" General Hammond had already read all of the pertinent information the archeologist and the astrophysicist had gathered. His own pile of documentation was even larger, though much neater, than Daniel's. He asked the question more for the benefit of the briefing log, and for certain members of SG-1 who weren't inclined to be quite so informed on scientific details.

"The MALP readings are like none I've ever seen, sir," Sam Carter answered. She folded her hands on the table and leaned forward. "The area that it surveyed shows an unbelievable number of energy readings."

"What kind of energy, Captain?"

"Some electrical, some low-level radiation—nothing dangerous. But there's a third form of energy, sir, and that's the interesting one. From what we can tell, it's not giving off any recognizable signature, but the MALP couldn't really get a clear reading on it. Every time the MALP approached it, the energy seemed to dissipate. And then it would reform in another location."

"So it was playing hide and seek?" Jack's voice clearly indicated his skepticism.

Carter smiled and nodded. "That's how it looked, sir."

"So what are we talking about then? Smart energy?"

Carter nodded again and her smile faded slightly. "It's possible. It definitely seemed to be moving with purpose."

"Dr. Jackson." Hammond's voice called SG-1's attention back to him. "You feel there is a cultural interest to be served here as well?"

"Yes, General." Daniel rooted through his papers again. After a brief search, he pulled out the digital images that the MALP had returned—computer enhanced and liberally scribbled on in his own handwriting. "There's a temple about a mile from the gate. Between the gate and that temple, but much closer to the gate, are two black obelisks. Now, the MALP didn't get close enough to show much detail, but what I can see …" Daniel's voice faded out as he focused his attention on the images.

"Uh, Daniel?" Jack asked. "What can you see?"

"Oh! Sorry." Daniel looked up and smiled quickly. "Hieroglyphs. There are hieroglyphs on them. Or at least, on one of them. And these aren't like any glyphs we've encountered off-world yet, sir, with the exception of Abydos. These are actual Egyptian hieroglyphs—the language doesn't seem to have evolved at all by the time these inscriptions were made."

"Implying what, Dr. Jackson?" Hammond asked.

"Implying that the civilization that lived here may have been direct descendants of those that were originally taken there from Earth. Possibly even the original people themselves. But there's more than that."

"Of course there is," Jack said.

Daniel turned one of the images around so the other four people at the table could see it. "The other pillar has markings on it too. And these …" Daniel tapped the picture with his fingers. "These seem to be the writing of one of the races from Heliopolis, Ernest's planet."

Jack's eyes widened. "So they're not the good guys, after all?"

"No, I think they are the good guys. The writing on the other pillar isn't Goa'uld. It's Egyptian." Daniel spun the picture back around and looked down at it intently. "I think that maybe this race, whoever they are, transported these people themselves."

"To what end?" Teal'c asked. "The Goa'uld took humans from this planet to use as their slaves. For what purpose would a benevolent race do the same?"

Daniel shook his head. "I'm not quite sure yet. Maybe to protect them from the Goa'uld? Maybe these people were somehow different from the rest of us. Maybe there was something about them that made it important that the Goa'uld never find them. Or maybe they just wanted to help humanity spread, to make sure we survived, no matter what happened on Earth."

Hammond paused for a moment, as if considering the implications of what he had just been told. "Can you make out what the inscriptions say, Dr. Jackson?"

Daniel shook his head. "Not completely, sir, no. I can identify a few specific symbols, but as for putting them in context, I'll have to see the obelisk up close."

"Captain Carter, does the MALP show any signs of life or current inhabitation?"

"None, sir. It seems to be completely deserted."

"That's that, then," Hammond declared. He gathered his papers as he stood. "SG-1, you have a go for P2A-759. You leave at 1030 hours tomorrow."

Jack stood up as Carter and Daniel gathered their reports and images. "So … energy readings for Carter to play games with and a nice, musty temple for Daniel to crawl around in." Jack pretended to ignore the irritated glares his teammates directed at him. "What are Teal'c and I supposed to do for the next three days?"

"Go sightseeing?" Daniel suggested.

"There are a lot of trees, Colonel," Sam said. "Maybe you could take up alien bird watching?"

"Perhaps, O'Neill," Teal'c said, "we should stand guard over Captain Carter and Daniel Jackson, should they run into unexpected complications."

"On an uninhabited planet?" Daniel asked.

"In the past, more than one uninhabited planet has proven to be quite … inhabited."

Carter shrugged her shoulders; Daniel looked back at Teal'c. Jack simply sighed.

"No, Teal'c, I think Daniel's probably right on this one." As the four made their way out of the Briefing Room and into the hallway, Jack made an over-exaggerated show of covering a yawn. "Prepare for three days in Carter and Daniel heaven."

At Teal'c's expression of confusion, Jack clarified, "Dirt, scribbles, and gadgets, Teal'c. Dirt, scribbles, and gadgets."

- - -

Aynad stood in the corridor as SG-1 walked past, though they could not see or hear either him or his companion.

"And so they return," he said.

"No," the man at his side replied. "They're going. They haven't been there yet."

Aynad turned his head and studied the blue eyes that looked back at him. "You delivered your warning?"

The other nodded. "He didn't understand it, though, just like I didn't. I waited too long; I should have started sooner. I knew when Jack was coming. He woke him—me—up before I had a chance to finish."

Aynad sighed slowly. "It begins again."

"No," the other answered, as he shook his head in defiance. "It's not going to happen. Not this time."

"It has happened many times," Aynad observed. "I fear that we will be as unsuccessful in our attempt as we have been in the past."

"I wasn't here then," the other said.

"In fact, you were. You have been with me for every attempt that has been made."

"But things are different every time, aren't they? I didn't have the message above the door. I only saw the eyes in my dream. I didn't have as many clues as we're leaving him."

"And the one that preceded you had more than this, and yet he still fell to the demon god."

"He's not a god," the other returned with anger in his voice. "He's not even a demon. He's a snake without a body, and he's walking around in mine."

"And so he will be again," Aynad said sadly.

"We'll stop him, Aynad," the other said as he turned away. "I'm not watching them die again."


	2. Chapter 2

- - -

Chapter Two

- - -

"Carter, I thought you said there were trees?"

Jack studied the landscape of P2A-759—not that there was much to study. The stargate was surrounded by a vast plain of three inch tall amber grass that waved gently in the light breeze. The position of the sun indicated that it was mid-afternoon on the planet, and the MALP had recorded a twenty-seven hour rotation. The temperature was cool enough to allow their jackets, but warm enough to not require them. A few light yellow clouds floated high in the golden sky. All in all, it seemed to be a very dull and boring place.

The wormhole closed behind him, signaling Daniel's arrival.

"Carter?"

Carter looked up at Jack from where she knelt on the stone platform in front of the stargate. She flipped her backpack open, reached in, and nodded her head in the direction of the gate. "They're behind the stargate, sir, over by Daniel's temple."

Jack turned to check the area that had been hidden behind the active wormhole and found the trees exactly where Carter had said they'd be, though the leaves did appear to be a bit more yellow than he would have expected. They were roughly a mile away and were clustered together around a small stone structure which Jack had to assume was actually a rather massive temple.

"And the lake would be … ?"

"Over there, Jack," Daniel answered. He waved one finger toward a smaller clump of yellow-leaved trees to the left of the temple.

Jack nodded in satisfaction, and turned back to his team. "Okay, kids. We've got three days in Kansas; let's make the most of it. Carter, you've got everything you need to track these peek-a-boo energy readings of yours?"

"Yes, sir," Carter answered with a smile. She held up a small hand-held instrument and waved the attached wand in the air. "I'm ready to go."

"Daniel, you're ready to go read those alien scribbles?"

Daniel rolled his eyes and turned away. "Inscriptions. And of course I am."

"Teal'c …?"

"I am prepared, O'Neill."

Jack nodded again. "All rightie, then. We'll follow the yellow …" Jack stopped when he realized just how relevant his quip was going to be on this world. If ever there was a planet that could be said to resemble Kansas, this was it—with only one small exception. He shook his head and threw a look across his shoulder at his second-in-command as he walked away. "Carter, why didn't you tell me that everything is yellow?"

- - -

Daniel ran his hands along the obelisk. The polished black stone was smooth—the only things that marked its surface were the carvings on each of its sides. He traced the outlines of the carved symbols with his finger and muttered to himself as he circled it. Jack, Sam, and Teal'c stood to the side and watched him.

"Beware … danger … demon god …"

"Oh, Daniel?" Jack asked. "How's it going over there?"

"Fine," Daniel answered automatically, giving the impression that he was answering a question he may or may not have even heard.

Jack raised his eyebrows and exchanged a glance with Teal'c. "It sounds a lot like one of those, 'beware all ye who enter here,' things."

Daniel glanced up from the obelisk in mild surprise and smiled. "That's probably because that's exactly what it is."

Jack started to answer, but before he could he noticed Carter wandering away. She stared down at the small screen in her hand and held the wand in front of her.

"Carter?" Jack called to her. "Where are you going?"

"Sorry, sir," she answered. She stopped walking and adjusted the strap on her shoulder. "One of those energy readings just appeared. It's moving toward the temple. I thought I'd try to track it, since Daniel's going to be busy here for a while."

Jack nodded. "All right, Carter. You go on ahead. Teal'c, watch her six. Daniel and I'll be fifteen minutes behind you."

Teal'c nodded and moved away as Carter called out, "Thank you, sir."

Daniel looked up from the obelisk again. "Fifteen minutes? Jack, I can't possibly read both of these in fifteen minutes."

"You don't need to read them," Jack replied. "We've got three days, Daniel. Pace yourself."

"Jack …"

"Just get the Cliff's Notes version for now. Take some video if you want. We can always come back later."

"All right." Daniel tossed his backpack to the ground and dug through it quickly. He pulled his video camera out and began filming. "You know, the best I'm going to be able to do with this second obelisk is compare it to the images I took of Heliopolis and Ernest's notes. I've still got no way of even guessing at what it says."

"I'm sure you'll do your best," Jack said with confidence.

"Yeah," Daniel answered. "But still, I really wish that I had at least some idea of what it says. I'm under the impression that these beings, whoever they are, are pretty powerful."

"What gives you that idea?"

Daniel shrugged and crossed to the other obelisk. He panned his camera around slowly. "I don't exactly know. But we know they were meeting with Thor's race thousands of years ago." Daniel lowered the camera and looked up at Jack. "Think about it, Jack. Those four races were meeting on that planet after the Goa'uld had started their rise to power. And despite the fact that the Goa'uld would have been a force to reckon with even then, there were no Goa'uld writings there."

Jack began to see where Daniel was going with his line of thinking. "So not just a United Nations, but an alliance, do you think?"

Daniel nodded and raised his camera. "Against the Goa'uld."

Jack cocked his head to the side and smiled. "It might be worth meeting these guys, then."

"Definitely." Daniel turned his camera off and tucked it back into his backpack. He closed the flap, grabbed the straps in his hand, and stood, brushing a few errant strands of yellow grass from his knees. "But for now, we have no idea where they are. All we know for sure is where they used to be."

"How long have they been gone?"

Daniel shook his head and shrugged. "I don't really know. But at a guess, I'd say these writings might actually pre-date the writings on P3X-972."

"A long time, then."

"A very long time."

- - -

"There are dozens of them here, Teal'c," Sam said. "And the closer we get to the temple, the more of them there are."

She looked up at the temple as they approached it. It was a massive structure—large by even Goa'uld standards. The brightly-colored paintings that covered its almost white surface stood out in sharp contrast to the vast yellow plain that surrounded it, giving it an almost mythical appearance. A long but shallow ramp led up from the ground to a large entrance that was flanked on either side by two pylons that each stood at least sixty feet tall.

The craftsmanship involved in the temple's construction was obvious. The outside surfaces of the walls were smooth; there were no seams visible between the stone blocks that she knew had to have been used to build them. It lacked even the marks of age that thousands of years of exposure to the elements should have caused—there were no cracks, or pits, or even certain areas that were rougher than others.

It was almost as though the temple had been frozen in time on the day it was completed.

She heard Teal'c step up beside her and turned to face him.

"Captain Carter, do you believe that the presence of so much of this energy may be unhealthy?"

Sam looked back down at the small screen in her hand and shook her head. "No. I'm not getting any indication of any unsafe levels of radiation or even electricity. I know that there are more of them, but they all seem to be giving off unique signatures. They don't seem to be blending or elevating the severity of the readings, just the amount of them."

At just that moment, she felt the hair on the back of her neck begin to rise and a now-familiar prickling sensation spread across her back. She shrugged slightly as the odd feeling moved up to her shoulders and down her arms. Her fingers started to tingle and a slight pressure began to build in her chest, causing her heart to flutter slightly.

Exactly as she had known would happen, when Sam looked down at the monitor again, another signature had appeared on it.

Sam decided to test her burgeoning theory. "Teal'c, are you feeling anything?"

"What do you mean?"

"Are you having any sort of physical reaction to them?"

Teal'c thought for a moment before answering. "I feel no differently now than I did when we first arrived on the planet. Why do you ask?"

Sam smiled, as much in confidence as in an attempt to ease the alarm that she knew her revelation would raise in Teal'c. "I think I can feel them, Teal'c. I think my body is reacting to them physically."

Teal'c's face hardened in concern. "The energy is having a negative effect on your body?"

Sam shook her head. "No, not negative. It's just … I know when a new one is coming." Sam saw the alarmed expression on Teal'c's face grow. "I might just be more sensitive to them than you are, Teal'c. There's no proof that I'm in any danger from them."

Teal'c looked around warily. "Perhaps these energy signatures are intended only to affect human physiology. Captain Carter, I do not believe that it is wise to move any closer to the temple at this time."

"Teal'c, I'm sure that everything is fine."

"I am afraid that I do not share your optimism. I believe it best that we wait for O'Neill and inform him of your observations."

"Inform him of what observations?" Jack asked from behind them.

Teal'c turned around to face the two men that approached them. "Captain Carter has made a discovery about the energy signatures, O'Neill."

"Oh yeah?" Jack smiled. "That was quick. What's up, Carter?"

Sam shook her head. "Sir, are either you or Daniel feeling anything right now?"

"Anything?" Jack asked.

Daniel waved his hand as though he were trying to swat away an annoying insect near his ear. "Like what, Sam?"

"Like tingling in your fingers, or pressure in your chest?"

Jack and Daniel looked at each other in confusion and then turned back to Sam.

"No," Jack answered. "Not feeling anything like that."

Daniel swatted at the insect again. "I don't feel anything either."

Sam smiled and turned back to Teal'c, confident that she had secured the colonel's approval to continue her research into the signatures. "See, Teal'c, I told you that I'm just a bit more sensitive to it. There's nothing to worry about." She patted Teal'c on the shoulder before moving toward the temple once more. "But thank you for your concern."

Jack gave Teal'c a questioning look, and Teal'c answered without hesitation. "Captain Carter believes that the energy is affecting her physically."

Jack stepped forward. "Hold up a sec, Carter," he said. He walked toward her and she turned to face him. "You can go, but …" Jack stopped, waiting until she was looking directly at him and he was certain that he had her undivided attention before continuing. "You're the only one who can feel these things. I'm not convinced that it's bad, but I'm not all that sure that it's good either."

"But, sir …" she started, but Jack cut her off with a wave of his hand.

"You can go, but I want you to keep an eye on this, okay? If these things get any stronger, if you start feeling weird, if it changes at all, I want you to back off."

"Sir …"

"I want you to back off, Carter. I'm serious. I don't want you taking any chances with this."

Sam nodded and tried to keep her disappointment from showing on her face. "Yes, sir."

Jack waved his hand toward the temple, and Carter moved away with a small smile on her face. Jack watched her go before turning and walking back to where Teal'c and Daniel stood.

Teal'c took one step toward him. "O'Neill, I am uneasy with Captain Carter approaching any nearer the temple."

Jack smiled reassuringly. "You heard the woman, Teal'c. There's nothing to worry about. Besides, do you really want to be the one to tell her that she has to spend the next three days sitting next to the gate?"

Teal'c didn't answer him.

"Relax, Teal'c. I know it's your nature to be on guard, but I really don't think there's anything here to guard against. I told her to keep an eye on things and I promise you, the moment I start to think that something's not quite right here, we'll all pack it up, okay?"

Teal'c raised his eyebrows, giving Jack the clear message that the Jaffa did not appreciate being dismissed so easily. Jack knew that the matter had not been dropped, but that Teal'c would put his feelings on hold for the time being. Jack gave a quick nod of understanding, which Teal'c returned in kind.

Jack turned away and glanced back over the nearly barren landscape. The stargate was still visible, though it was little more than a dark spot on the horizon. He turned back around to face the temple in front of them. He'd been right about it; it was massive.

"Okay, Teal'c. You stay out here with Carter; see if you can't catch one of those energy thingies for her. Daniel and I are gonna take a look around the temple and see if we can find anything interesting."

"As you wish, O'Neill," Teal'c answered with a nod.

"Daniel …" Jack turned to where Daniel had been standing only to find him no longer there. Jack shifted his gaze back toward the temple and was not surprised to see Daniel already walking up the ramp.

"Oh, Daniel!"

"Yes, Jack?" Daniel stopped where he was and turned around.

"Did you hear the word 'we' in that sentence?"

Daniel watched Jack walk toward him. "Huh?"

"Because I distinctly remember saying 'we.' And you know, with you being a linguist and all, you should really know that the definition of the word 'we' is not 'Daniel,' or 'just Daniel,' or 'Daniel by himself.' "

Daniel looked at Jack in confusion as the older man reached his side and stopped. "Jack, what are you talking about?"

Jack sighed and turned to face Daniel on the ramp. "I said that 'we' were going to check out the temple, Daniel. That means both of us." Jack heard Daniel's exaggerated sigh behind him as he started walking again. "Don't roll your eyes. You're stuck with me."

A few moments of silence followed before Daniel said quietly, "I wasn't rolling my eyes."

"Of course you were."

"No, I wasn't."

"Were so."

"Was not." Daniel sighed heavily as he followed Jack through the entrance and into the hypostyle hall of the temple. "And why do you always insist on … wow!"

Sunlight streamed in around them, through the entrance behind them and down through the open roof above. It shone into every corner and glittered on the brightly painted glyphs and golden accents on the walls. Massive columns rose up around them, towering over them—the wide, white stone bases ended where the roof would have been and were capped with detailed carvings of deep amber grasses. A large opening in the wall opposite the one they had just entered through led into what appeared to be the sanctuary.

"This is amazing," Daniel said breathlessly. He walked to one of the walls and began reading the inscriptions. "Welcome, brother, to our sanctuary. Herein lie the answers to all questions. Take heart and have faith, and the truth will be revealed."

Daniel turned to Jack with wide-eyed excitement. "This is Egyptian. I was right. There's been absolutely no evolution of the language at all."

Jack smiled as he glanced around the room. The structure appeared solid; there were no cracks in the walls, no fallen supports, and no collapsed sections of floor. Despite the obvious age of the structure, it looked completely safe. Whoever had built it had clearly intended it to last.

As Daniel turned back toward the wall once more, Jack's eyes were drawn to a large inscription above the door to the inner chamber. Unlike most of the glyphs on the walls, these were carved, not painted, and they weren't glyphs, they were letters. "Um, Daniel? You're sure these guys were Egyptian?"

"Positive, Jack. Why?"

Jack pointed at the writings he'd found. "Because that doesn't look Egyptian to me."

Daniel looked up and in the direction that Jack was pointing. His eyes widened further.

"That's not Egyptian," he agreed. His voice sounded confused. "That's Latin."

"What does it say?"

"Ex quattuor alio adveho unus mens. Ex unus mens adveho tres phasmatis."

Jack rolled his eyes. "Okay then, what does it mean?"

"From four bodies comes one mind. From one mind come three spirits."

Jack blinked and frowned slightly. "No, Daniel, what does it mean?"

Daniel shook his head slowly. "I have no idea." He smiled broadly and took a step toward the chamber. Jack's hand on his arm stopped him. "What?"

"Where are you going?"

"In there," Daniel answered simply.

Jack indicated the hall around them with his wave of his arm. "What about this stuff out here?"

"Well, what's out here tells me that the answers to my questions are in there."

"Where does it say that?" Jack asked.

Daniel pointed toward the section of wall he had translated. "It says that the answers are in the sanctuary." He gestured toward the door under the Latin writing. "That's the sanctuary."

The shadows in the sanctuary were already beginning to grow out from the corners, and he had hoped to keep Daniel in the bright atmosphere of the outer hall until sundown, with a promise of entering the inner chamber at first light. It was obvious, however, that Daniel had his mind set on going straight to the heart of the matter, so to speak. Jack sighed and relented.

"Okay, but the first question I want you to find an answer for is mine."

"Sure," Daniel said. "What is it you want to know?"

Jack pointed up at the out-of-place Latin inscription once more. "What the heck does that mean?"

- - -

Aynad watched Jack and Daniel enter the central chamber and shook his head again. "He does not understand."

"Give him time," the other said softly.

"They have entered the sanctuary!" Aynad said in dismay. "Already it is too late."

"No," the other replied. "He's got an hour. He'll figure it out."

"How can you be so certain of this?" Aynad demanded.

"Because I know him," was the murmured answer. "I know all of them. They'll figure it out."

"Time grows too short. He approaches even now."

"We can do this, Aynad!" the other snapped suddenly. "You've just got to give us a chance to do it. As long as we're together …"

Aynad turned toward the man as his voice faded. "What do you intend to do?"

"We have to be together," the other answered. "We have to do it together. That's what I didn't have. That's what none of us had."

"I do not understand."

A smile crept across the man's face, the first smile that Aynad had seen there in the four weeks that they had been together, or on any of those that had come before.

"You don't have to understand, Aynad. This is SG-1 we're talking about here. United we stand, divided we fall." The smile grew and the blue eyes sparkled with a hope that Aynad had thought he would never see. "We have to do it together, or we can't do it at all."

"This is not possible."

"Of course it is. We only have to enhance the natural responses that already exist. We won't even be changing things, not really."

"What benefit will there be in this? You know that they will not remember these things afterward."

"So we do a little reminding," the other answered with a shrug.

"They will not believe," Aynad said.

"Jack will," the other answered. "Jack always does. With a little help, so will Sam and Teal'c. And once they believe in him, they'll be able to reach him."

"How do you intend to do this? He will be stranded here with us. He will not be with them."

"Yes, he will," the man answered with certainty. "One way or another, Daniel Jackson is leaving this planet."

- - -

An hour later, Jack emerged from the temple. "So, Daniel's comfy in there," he remarked as he walked out. He scanned the area and spotted Teal'c immediately, standing at the base of the ramp. Carter, however, was nowhere to be seen. "How are things going out here?"

"Things are well, O'Neill," Teal'c answered. He tilted his chin toward the far west corner of the temple. Jack looked in the direction that Teal'c was indicating and found Carter, waving her instruments with one hand and gesturing angrily with the other.

"Any luck catching Carter's hide-and-seek energy thingies?"

Teal'c shook his head. "None. To my knowledge, Captain Carter has been unable to measure the energy signatures any more accurately than the initial probe was."

Jack winced in sympathy. "Is she yelling yet?"

"Indeed. Loudly."

Almost as if on cue, Carter's voice floated toward them from the corner of the temple. "Hold still, damn it!"

Jack smiled and placed a hand on Teal'c's shoulder. "I feel for ya, big guy."

"You do not," Teal'c replied evenly.

Jack pulled his hand back and smiled again. "Of course I do. I feel sorry for you, and I feel glad it's not me."

Teal'c simply raised an eyebrow.

Jack glanced up at the sky and noted that though the cloud cover had not increased, the area around the temple seemed darker than he remembered it being. The structure appeared to be falling under some sort of shadow, but the rest of the plain was as bright as it had been when they'd arrived. Jack rubbed his eyes and tried to clear them, but found that nothing had changed.

"Hey, Teal'c, is it just me, or is it getting kind of foggy out here?"

Teal'c looked around quickly. "I see no fog, O'Neill." He turned back to Jack in concern. "Are your eyes ceasing to function properly?"

Jack blinked a few times. "No, my eyes are fine. They're probably just not completely adjusted to being back out in the sun again." He blinked again. "It'll clear up in a minute. I just wanted to make sure that we weren't about to get rained on."

Teal'c nodded, but his expression of concern did not change. "O'Neill, my initial discomfort has not faded."

"What is it, Teal'c? What's bothering you so much about this temple?"

"I am not certain. I only know that my symbiote has been growing steadily more agitated since our arrival here. In recent moments, that agitation has doubled."

"Is that … abnormal?"

Teal'c shook his head slowly. "It is not. It is possible that my body has contracted an illness which my symbiote is repairing. However, if that is the case, then it is an illness that I am unaware of having developed."

"Maybe Junior's just having a bad day, Teal'c."

Teal'c nodded. "Indeed."

Jack blinked twice more and turned his attention back to the temple. "I'm gonna head back inside and check on Daniel. I'll give him a couple of hours to work before dinner. We'll see you then."

"Oh, come on! Just give me ten seconds!" Carter's voice sounded fainter than it had before.

Jack winced slightly. "Go herd her back this way, will ya, Teal'c? Try to keep her near the temple."

Teal'c nodded once and moved off in the direction Carter's voice had come from.

Jack sighed as he headed back up the steps. "We should charge by the hour for our babysitting services."

- - -

The two men stood together at the top of the ramp, watching Jack as he climbed toward them and walked back into the temple.

"Perhaps we need to enhance them again," Aynad suggested.

"No," the other answered. "We've done all we can with them for now. But I'm not done with them just yet."

"He grows ever nearer," Aynad said nervously. "Within moments, he will move against him."

"Not just him," the other returned. "This time, he's going to get all of them."

Aynad turned toward his companion in shock. "I thought you meant to save them!"

"I do," the other answered slowly. "And I will." The man smiled once more as he turned toward the entrance. "Come with me, Aynad. It's almost time for you to meet Daniel."


	3. Chapter 3

- - -

Chapter Three

- - -

Jack walked through the door and into the large inner chamber of the temple. He shook his head and stifled a laugh. Daniel hadn't really moved since Jack had left, except for the fact that he was standing on his toes on an overturned altar.

"Daniel?"

"Hm? Oh, hey, Jack."

"Daniel, what exactly are you doing?"

"I'm trying to figure out what this says, actually." Daniel brushed his hands on his pants and jumped to the floor. "I know I've seen that symbol before—pretty recently, in fact. I just can't remember what it represents."

Daniel swatted at the air next to his ear again, his expression one of extreme irritation.

Jack leaned his shoulder against the large door frame and glanced around at the rest of the glyphs that covered the walls. "Can you read the rest of it?"

"Most of it, yes. There's one section of the same writing that's on the obelisk outside—the writing from Ernest's planet. I can't read that, of course, but I can read the rest of it."

"Okay. So what does it say?"

Daniel swatted at the air once more, and then pointed up at the words as he translated. "Okay, well, it's another warning. 'Beware the god … that's the name I can't decipher … who shall surely steal away your immortal soul.' "

"That doesn't sound fun."

"No. Right now, I'm thinking it's a simplistic explanation of being taken as a host. A little further in … right here," Daniel explained as he pointed out a different section of the writings. "This describes this … being … as the 'Possessor of Souls.' And that passage over there …" Daniel motioned with his arm toward the other side of the room. "… calls him the 'Thief of the Spirit.' "

After every three or four words, Daniel batted at the air or ducked his head. After his speech was delivered, Jack rolled his eyes and finally made mention of the odd behavior.

"Daniel, what are you doing?"

"What?" Daniel ducked quickly to the side and swatted at the air yet again. He turned back to Jack with an expression of understanding on his face. "Oh, that! There's an insect of some sort in here, and it keeps buzzing around my head. It's too small for me to see, but I can hear it." Daniel batted out again and turned to Jack with an exasperated look on his face. "It's starting to get really annoying."

Jack smiled in amusement and turned back to the original topic. "Okay, so I take it the locals didn't like this guy much."

"Would you?" Daniel looked around the room and gestured toward the walls around them. "There are hundreds of stories on these walls, and every single one of them seems to be about Goa'uld possession."

Jack gripped his gun a bit tighter and rubbed his eyes as he moved closer to Daniel. "Doesn't that seem like an awful lot of possessions for just one snakehead?"

"Yes, it does. I'm wondering if maybe there weren't multiple Goa'uld here, and the people just thought they were all the same being because of their eyes."

Jack tilted his head slightly. "I thought these guys didn't like to share planets."

"With the exception of Earth, you're right. We're pretty sure that Ra and Apophis were both on Earth at the same time. And from what I learned from Nem, it seems that Belos …" Daniel's voice trailed off and he snapped his fingers. "That's it!"

Jack looked at him in confusion. "What's what?"

"Belos."

"Bellows?"

"No, Belos."

"Huh?"

"The name," Daniel explained as he pointed out the symbol again. "It's Belos."

"Nem's Belos?"

"Yes."

"Killed-Omaroca-Belos?"

"Yes."

"Here?"

Daniel bit down a laugh and nodded. "It would seem so, Jack, yes."

Jack glanced around the temple and noted the growing shadows with a newfound apprehension. "Okay, well, do you think that maybe we should be …?"

"Hundreds of stories, Jack. I brought a lantern with me, and besides," Daniel continued with a wry smile, "I haven't been afraid of the dark since I was seven."

"Hey now," Jack protested. He lifted Daniel's pack from the temple floor and slung it across his shoulder. "I was Special Ops, remember? The dark is afraid of me."

"Jack, what are you doing? I can't leave now; I've got too much work to do."

"Nope. Not tonight you don't. Ah!" Jack raised one finger and stopped further objections before they could be raised. "I'm not afraid of the dark. But … dark temples filled with stories about spirit thieves and soul stealers and Goa'uld who kill nice fish-people do make me a little nervous. So humor me, Dr. Jackson. You're done until morning." His decision made, Jack turned and walked toward the door.

There was no response.

"Daniel?" Jack turned back around and found Daniel staring intently at the first section of writing he had shown him. "Daniel, did you hear a word I just said?"

Daniel glanced at Jack over his shoulder and turned back to the wall. "Jack? What's that?"

Jack turned his attention to the wall Daniel was focused on. He noticed immediately that one of the symbols, the one Daniel had identified as Belos, had begun to glow with an unearthly blue light.

"That … is not good. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that's probably bad. Come on, Daniel, we're outta here."

Jack felt an overwhelming urge to physically remove Daniel from the room, and he acted on it. He reached out and grabbed Daniel's arm as the archeologist slowly backed away from the wall.

The symbol flashed.

"Oh, crap!"

Suddenly, both men found themselves engulfed in a beam of light that emanated from the symbol.

Jack tried to back away, jump to the side, lift his weapon, but his muscles would not respond to his attempts to move. He couldn't so much as twitch a finger. His heart began to pound and his head began to throb. He felt dizzy, lightheaded, and vaguely disconnected from his body, all at the same time. Nausea washed over him as he stood frozen, trapped in and paralyzed by the pulsating blue beam.

"Colonel?" Sam's voice floated in from the outer hall.

"Daniel Jackson? Are you within?"

_"Sam! Teal'c! Don't come in here!" _Daniel shouted.

"Daniel?" Sam's calm response to Daniel's warning took Jack by surprise. "Did you see something come in here?"

_"God, Sam, stay out of here!"_

"It was the strangest thing," Sam continued. Her voice was growing louder and clearer and Jack knew that she was approaching the door. "It was a cloud or a shadow of some sort. It went right through the wall."

Confused by Sam's lack of reaction to Daniel's frantic shouts and dismayed that she continued to approach the room, Jack tried a different approach. _"Captain, you will not enter this room! That is an order!"_

"It seemed to be moving with purpose …" Sam kept talking, but her words were drowned out by a loud sigh and Daniel's voice.

_"Why isn't she listening to us?"_

_"How should I know?"_ Jack asked.

_"Um …"_Daniel's voice was suddenly hesitant. _"I didn't say that out loud."_

As Jack considered the implications of Daniel's statement, he made several sudden realizations.

The first thing Jack noticed was that his eyes were closed, but he knew that Daniel's were open. He could feel the position of his eyelids and knew that they were closed; yet he could still see the door. He stared at it in anticipation of Sam and Teal'c's arrival. Though it confused him and he had no idea why it was happening, he knew that the only way he could be doing that was if he were somehow seeing through Daniel's eyes.

Jack then realized that his right hand was still wrapped securely around Daniel's left arm. He also felt, in a strangely distant way, that someone was grasping his left arm, though he knew that he and Daniel were the only two people in the room. So, not just seeing through Daniel's eyes, but feeling everything the other man felt, as though the two people they were had ceased to exist, and they had become the same person.

The darkness that had plagued Jack's vision throughout the day had returned and seemed to be growing worse. The entire room seemed to be bathed in shadows. In addition, he had begun to hear a buzzing noise, as though there were an insect hovering right beside his ear. The sound was growing in both intensity and volume, and his head began to pound and throb incessantly. Daniel had been right when he'd said the buzzing was more than a little annoying.

_"Jack?"_

_"Daniel?"_

_"I can hear you," _Daniel said.

_"And I can hear you," _Jack answered back.

Both men watched through Daniel's eyes as Sam and Teal'c walked through the door. Two minds and two voices spoke a single thought in unison.

"_But they can't hear us."_

"O'Neill!"

"Daniel!"

They saw Sam and Teal'c focus immediately on the glyph that was the source of the beam. They saw them raise their weapons. The buzzing in their ears grew louder and more insistent, and they both somehow knew that shooting the glyph was a bad idea. They cried out together, a warning that only they heard.

"_No!"_

For a fraction of a second, it seemed to have worked. Sam hesitated, darting glances back and forth between the two men trapped in the beam and the glyph it emanated from. When she locked eyes with Daniel, Jack thought that she had heard them. When she moved to lower her weapon, Daniel thought that they had managed to get through to her. Their relief did not last long.

"Captain Carter!" Teal'c said. "We must release them."

Sam and Teal'c fired as one.

Again, the buzzing intensified.

The bullets from Sam's gun bounced off of the wall and ricocheted around the room wildly. Jack felt searing bolts of pain tear through his left shoulder and right leg and a cry of agony pierced his mind. Jack felt another white-hot pain shoot down the side of his head, and his groan mixed with Daniel's scream.

The buzzing grew frantic.

The beam's reaction to the energy from Teal'c's staff weapon was entirely different. At first, it seemed that the wall had completely absorbed the blast. For the briefest of seconds, the beam seemed to be shrinking. Just as Jack thought that he and Daniel were about to be released, the beam pulsed again, more forcefully than before. To Jack, it felt as though every nerve in his body was on fire and he was burning from the inside out. Another scream echoed in his mind, and he knew that Daniel had felt the same thing.

The fact that these cries seemed to echo back at him made Jack think that he was hearing them both in his mind and with his ears. One look at Sam and Teal'c, at their wide eyes and faces suddenly devoid of color, confirmed Jack's belief. His and Daniel's screams had been real, and Sam and Teal'c had heard them.

"Oh, God," Sam gasped. "We've got to get them out of there. Teal'c, grab him!"

The men's ability to communicate with their teammates vanished as suddenly as it had appeared. Both of their protests echoed in Jack's mind, but neither Sam nor Teal'c heard them. Jack felt Sam's hands wrap around his arms, and he knew that Teal'c had grasped Daniel's.

"We've got you!" Jack heard Sam say._ "Colonel, I've got you."_

_"Daniel Jackson, I am here."_

Jack's heart sank in unison with Daniel's as they both realized that the beam had imprisoned Sam and Teal'c along with them.

Then it was gone.

Jack opened his eyes to find himself staring directly into Sam's. His nerves were screaming in agony, his leg and shoulder burned, and his head ached. He blinked slowly, and the shadows that blurred his vision seemed to grow even larger as he felt himself sliding toward unconsciousness.

Jack didn't realize that he was still holding Daniel's arm until he felt the younger man fall away from him. He released his hold just barely in time to keep from being pulled over. The pain he felt from his seared nerves lessened considerably, and the pain in his shoulder and leg disappeared entirely.

"Daniel?" That was all Jack managed to say before the room went black and he felt himself falling to the floor.

- - -

"Oh, God," the other gasped.

Aynad turned toward him in anger. "Explain how this has made the situation better! You nearly killed them!"

The other closed his eyes and took a long, shaking breath. "They're alive."

"He is weakened!" Aynad spat. "You were not strong enough to resist the demon god, and you were undamaged!"

The other did not open his eyes, but tilted his head as though he were concentrating on a distant memory.

"You have managed to alter the situation, my friend, but only to make it worse. Soon, you will be gone, and he will take your place."

A faint smile appeared on the other's lips. "No, Belos can't touch him."

"How do you know this?"

The blue eyes opened again, and the smile widened. "It worked," the other replied simply. "He won't know how to separate them. He'll have to figure that out, and that will give them the time they need to get back through the gate." He raised his eyebrows and tilted his head in mild surprise. "It worked."

Aynad shook his head sadly. "My friend, it cannot have worked in the way you believe it has."

"Why do you say that?"

"If the demon god is prevented from taking him, then you will cease to exist."

"I know that," the other replied. "I don't care if I don't exist. They will—that's what's important."

"Then you must understand that they are not yet safe."

Silence and confusion were the only responses.

Aynad stepped forward and placed a comforting hand on his companion's arm. "Daniel, you are still here."

Daniel's arms fell to his sides. He closed his eyes and sighed as the meaning of Aynad's words sank in.

He was the eleventh Daniel Jackson who had fallen to Belos. He was the eleventh Daniel Jackson who had stood, helpless, disconnected from his own body, unable to stop the monster that had possessed him, as Belos used that body to slaughter his friends. He was the eleventh Daniel Jackson who had watched Belos walk through the stargate, hidden behind the face of an archeologist, straight to an unsuspecting Earth. He was the tenth Daniel Jackson to be caught up in a time loop that Aynad had started, a loop that the first Daniel Jackson had begged him to create, a loop that would restart every time Daniel failed to protect his friends and save himself.

He was the first Daniel Jackson who had thought, had truly believed, that he would be able to stop it. He'd been so convinced that he knew how to do it, so certain that blending the four members of SG1 was the key to saving them all.

But Aynad was right. If his plan had worked the way he'd thought it would, he wouldn't be standing there. If the twelfth Daniel Jackson survived, then the eleventh Daniel Jackson would cease to exist – that's the way things had to be. The fact that he hadn't vanished could mean only one thing.

The twelfth Daniel Jackson was still in very real danger.

Daniel opened his eyes again and looked directly at Aynad. He refused to admit that he'd failed completely; he couldn't give up. He'd sworn to his Jack, as he'd watched him die, that he'd never let it happen again. His current failure was only a temporary set-back, nothing more. He could still succeed. He had to.

He would be the last Daniel Jackson to watch SG1 die by his own hands, no matter how far he had to go.

He took a deep breath and let a small smile play at the corners of his mouth. "Well then, as Jack would say, it's time for Plan B."

"What is Plan B?" Aynad asked.

"I need you to do something you've never done before, Aynad. Daniel needs to know exactly happened to you – and to me."

- - -

His first indication that consciousness had returned was the pain. His head throbbed in perfect time with his heartbeat. He still felt as if every nerve in his body was on fire, but at least it had abated somewhat; what had been a raging inferno had dulled to a steady smolder.

He felt hands pressing against his head and tried to turn away. Even that small movement caused enough pain to pull a moan from his lips.

"Colonel?" Sam's concerned voice rang in his ears and echoed loudly through the pounding in his brain. "Sir, can you hear me?"

"Loud and clear, Captain," Jack gasped.

"Sir, can you tell me if you're in pain?"

"You could say that, yeah."

"Where, sir?"

"Everywhere, Carter."

He heard her sigh; he knew he wasn't being the most cooperative of patients.

"My head feels like half of it got blown off, and my nerves feel like someone's fried them up for dinner. Other than that, I'm fine."

"Can you open your eyes?"

Jack hadn't realized that his eyes were still closed until that moment. He opened them immediately, and regretted it just as quickly. He slammed them shut again with a groan. "Okay, that hurts."

"Try opening them slowly, sir."

"Oh, that'll hurt too. It'll just hurt … slowly." With a great effort, Jack forced his eyes open again. He blinked rapidly until they adjusted to the fading sunlight that shone through the open roof above him. "Ow."

Sam's concerned face appeared in front of him. "Colonel, can you see me?"

"My, what big eyes you have," he answered weakly.

Jack smiled as Sam visibly relaxed, but she tensed up again almost immediately.

"Sir, about your head …"

"Don't sweat it, Carter," he interrupted. "That thing had us, and you tried to take it out. I'd have done the same thing."

"I must apologize as well, O'Neill." Teal'c's voice came from somewhere off to his right. Jack thought that turning his head to find him would be a bad idea. "I did not anticipate the energy from my staff weapon being turned against you."

"Not a problem, Teal'c," Jack returned as he leaned his head back against the pack that pillowed it. "No way you could have known."

Jack looked around slowly without moving his head. He needed to assure himself that his entire team was still in one piece. Sam was still kneeling at his side. Teal'c he knew was somewhere close, to his right. Daniel was …

"Where's Daniel?" Jack demanded. He sat up quickly, groaned, and grasped his head in pain. Sam grabbed his arms and pushed him back down.

"Colonel, stay still. You shouldn't be moving around just yet."

"Where's Daniel?" he repeated, more insistent. Jack couldn't explain the urgency of his need to know where Daniel was; he only knew that it was vital that he find out. "He's hurt worse than I am …"

Sam looked surprised at the declaration, but only nodded slowly in response.

"So where is he? Daniel!"

"Daniel Jackson is here, O'Neill," Teal'c answered calmly. "He has not yet regained consciousness."

Jack turned his attention to Sam and locked eyes with her. "Give it to me."

Sam sighed and the guilt returned to her face. "He got hit twice, sir. Once in the left shoulder, and once in the right thigh. Both are through and through."

Jack nodded slowly. He had known about those wounds. He had actually felt them. But he saw something more in Sam's eyes—something that said that there was more to the story.

"And?"

"And, sir, it's very possible that the bullet that grazed your head had already been through his shoulder. So its velocity had been decreased by …"

"So if Daniel hadn't been in the way, I would have gotten half of my head blown off?"

"Very possibly, sir."

"Damn," Jack muttered. "I owe him big time for that one."

The look that crossed Sam's face told Jack that he owed Daniel for more than slowing a bullet down.

"What?"

"He was standing in front of you, sir. He was closer to the source of the beam. When it directed that staff blast at you …"

"He got more of it than I did." Jack spoke the words with certainty; he'd known that too. The second he'd released Daniel's arm, the pain he'd felt had more than halved.

Sam nodded. "That's the way it looked, sir. That's why I told Teal'c to grab him …"

"Hey!" Jack interrupted. "That thing grabbed the two of you too! Are you guys okay?"

"We are well, O'Neill."

"We weren't in it long, sir. If I had to guess, I'd say no more than thirty seconds. We lost consciousness not long after you and Daniel did, but we woke up sooner."

"How long?" Jack asked. His headache had eased somewhat, and he risked turning his head to look from Sam to Teal'c.

"I awakened within two minutes, O'Neill. Captain Carter awoke no more than three minutes later."

"Okay, so how long have we been here?" Jack moved his head slowly as he looked around. He realized, for the first time, that they were still inside the temple. "And why are we still here?"

"It took you half an hour to wake up, sir. Daniel's still unconscious. We risked moving you both out of the room, but I couldn't have carried either one of you, and Teal'c couldn't carry both of you. And we weren't about to leave either one of you here, sir."

"Good call, Captain," Jack said with a small nod of approval. "Wait until one of us wakes up, and carry the other if we need to." Jack turned his head until he could see Daniel.

Daniel was lying on the floor four feet away with his head propped up on a backpack, just as Jack was. Jack searched the pale face for signs of waking. He found none.

"We're gonna need to," he announced.

"We should wait a few more minutes, sir. You need a chance to rest before you try to walk, and he might wake up by then."

"I'm good, Captain," Jack said. He rolled slightly to his left, pressed his hands against the floor, and pushed himself to his knees. The movement caused his stomach to lurch in protest, and Jack let his head sag toward his chest.

"Colonel!"

"O'Neill!"

Jack looked up at his worried friends with a small smile. "It's just a headache and a little possible nerve damage," he said. "No biggie." Jack pushed himself to his feet and forced himself to walk the few steps to Daniel's side. It wasn't that he didn't trust Carter's evaluation, but something inside his mind told him it was imperative that he find out for himself. He had to touch him, to make absolutely certain that he was still there.

As soon as he was close enough, Jack reached out and placed his hand on Daniel's arm. He sat down carefully and glanced across at Teal'c, who knelt protectively at Daniel's side. He nodded once and then turned his full attention to Daniel.

Sam had opened the seam of his black T-shirt to bandage both the entrance and exit wounds on his left shoulder. His right pant leg was similarly ripped, and his thigh was wrapped in a generous amount of gauze. Both bandages showed evidence of blood seepage.

Daniel was pale, and when Jack pressed his hand to Daniel's forehead, he found the skin cool to the touch and slightly clammy. He grasped Daniel's wrist and felt a pulse that was steady and only a little slower than normal.

Jack's first instinct was to gather his team up and get them the hell off of the planet immediately. Daniel needed medical attention—in fact, all four of them did. They'd all been trapped in the beam, and he knew that taking chances with alien technology was a bad idea. However, the few seconds that he'd managed to stay on his feet had brought him to the conclusion that it would be several more minutes before he could even start to contemplate the journey.

Jack turned his attention to the two mobile members of his team.

"You two seem to be moving around pretty well," he observed of Sam and Teal'c.

"Captain Carter and I appear to have suffered no ill effects from the alien beam."

"None?"

Sam shook her head slowly.

"Nothing?"

Teal'c shook his head almost regretfully.

"Not even a teeny tiny little headache?"

"Not even a hint of one, Colonel."

"So everything that's wrong with Daniel and me … ?"

"We caused, sir," Sam interrupted softly. She lowered her head in shame. "I'm sorry, Colonel. If I'd known …"

"Hey! What'd I tell you? I'd have done the same thing. In fact … I'm going to make it a standing team order. Whenever any of us gets caught in some weird alien beam, the rest of us will shoot it." Jack looked again from Sam to Teal'c. "Got that?"

"How many alien beams can there be in the galaxy, sir?"

"In fact, Captain Carter, there may be many. Had we attempted to destroy Thor's Hammer when it first probed Daniel Jackson …"

"Okay, Teal'c, I'll give you that. But …"

"That blue crystal thingy definitely had a beam of some sort," Jack added.

"All right, so two …"

"The being Nem was an alien, and he also possessed a beam."

"Oh yeah. Big honkin' alien beam there."

"Okay, okay, I get the point." Sam rolled her eyes and raised her hands in surrender. "If we see any more alien beams, we shoot them."

Jack smiled. "Good girl, Carter."


	4. Chapter 4

- - -

Chapter Four

- - -

_It had not always been as it was._

_The planet teemed with life of all kinds—insects hummed and buzzed around the brightly colored flowers that grew in the yards around the small dwellings. Children ran and played and laughed in the wild yellow grasses. Mothers tended their homes with care; fathers tended their trades with dedication. Everywhere he looked he saw peace, and happiness, and joy._

_Daniel walked through the village unseen, basking in the beauty of a place that he knew no longer existed._

_"What is this place?" he asked of no one._

_"This is our home, Daniel."_

_Daniel spun quickly toward the voice and saw a man who was clearly of Egyptian heritage. His head was shaved bare, with the exception of the long black hair pulled into a single braid and banded tightly on the left side—a prince's lock. His white skirt hung to just above his knees, and a single band rose from it and draped across his shoulder. He smiled at Daniel fondly and stepped toward him._

_"It is beautiful, is it not?"_

_Daniel nodded, although confusion was written clearly on his face. "Yes, it is."_

_The man nodded once and turned to watch a group of children run past._

_"Do I know you?" Daniel asked. "How do you know my name?"_

_"You do not," the man replied. "I do, however, know you. I have met you many times, my friend." The man bowed from the waist. "I am Aynad."_

_Daniel realized that both he and Aynad were speaking in Ancient Egyptian, though he didn't remember consciously making an effort to do so. He looked back across the village once more. "So this is what this place once looked like?"_

_"It is," Aynad replied. "We were happy here, at peace and prosperous."_

_"How did you get here?" Daniel asked._

_Aynad smiled softly. "We were the chosen survivors of a village on your Earth. We were brought to this world by our protectors, a race of men become angels. They wished us to live our lives in happiness, away from the darkness that had fallen over our home. And so they brought us to this place."_

_"So what happened?" Daniel asked. A small child ran toward him, naked and laughing. The boy stopped a few feet away, looked up at Daniel, and smiled. "Where did you go? Why did you leave?"_

_The small boy faded into nothingness, and when Daniel lifted his head again, the village was gone. Dark clouds boiled in the yellow skies above him, and thunder rumbled in the distance. The clouds were split by streaks of lightning that tore their way to the ground. One ripped itself from the sky and impacted the spot that the boy had been standing on only seconds before. Daniel fell to his knees and threw his arms up to protect his face from the debris that erupted from the ground._

_"The demon god comes."_

_"What?" Daniel asked. He turned toward the stargate quickly and saw the wormhole forming. A hulking form appeared through the shimmering vortex. As the hulking creature stopped to survey his surroundings, turning its large head left to right slowly, Daniel's breath caught in his throat._

_"That's an Unas!" he cried out. _

_The roaring wind whipped his hair so hard that it stung his face, and he pushed it behind his ears impatiently. The Unas stepped down from the dais slowly, methodically, and began to walk directly toward Daniel. Daniel's eyes widened and he pushed himself to his feet slowly. He ignored the wind, the thunder, and the lightning, and focused all of his attention on the massive creature that approached him._

_"My God," he breathed. "That's Belos."_

_Another bolt of lightning struck the ground in front of him, and Daniel spun away. When he turned back again, Belos was gone._

_"Aynad!" he called out. "Aynad, what's happening?"_

"These things have already been written. They cannot be changed."

_Daniel spun frantically in the maelstrom as he tried to find the man he heard in his mind. "What is this?"_

"This is an image of our history, Daniel. These are things you must see."

_"I don't understand!" Daniel cried out. "I don't understand what's happening."_

"For nine generations, our people existed in peace, prosperity, and happiness. The arrival of the demon god destroyed us all, one by one."

_The voice began to float away, toward the temple. Daniel ducked from another bolt of lightning and followed, pushing his hair behind his ears as he went._

"He wished to become as our protectors—one with the universe. He wished to take for himself the power that they did not abuse. He wished to dominate us even as they wished only to preserve us."

_"Aynad!"_

"Listen well, Daniel, and hear me. He took our souls, and made them prisoners in a hell of his own making. He took our bodies and used them for his own purposes. My hands took the lives of my brothers, my sisters, my mother. Those whose souls he could not steal, he destroyed. He killed us all."

_"But this happened thousands of years ago," Daniel protested as he walked up the ramp toward the pylons that flanked the entrance to the temple. "What does this have to do with me?"_

"He comes again, Daniel. The demon god has awakened."

_"Wait!" Daniel pulled back slightly and half-turned toward the opening he had just entered through. "Belos is still alive? He's here?"_

"Follow and behold, Daniel. As you have seen my past, see now one vision of yours."

_Daniel turned his head slowly and looked through the door into the sanctuary chamber. He saw himself lying on the floor, and Jack lying beside him. Sam and Teal'c stood above them, looking down at them in concern. Daniel recognized the situation immediately as a possible outcome of the events that had transpired with the beam, but for some reason he couldn't explain, it seemed wrong. The shadows were deeper than he remembered them being, giving him the impression that a great deal of time had passed, but it was more than that. Something deep in his mind cried out in warning, and he felt disconnected from himself. The harder he tried to identify the source of his discomfort, the stronger the feelings became._

_"This isn't right," Daniel whispered. "What is this?"_

"This is what the past once held for you and yours, Daniel. And what the future holds still,"_ Aynad returned quietly. _"Only you can change it."

_Daniel watched as one of the shadows separated itself from the rest and moved across the room to hover above his body. It hesitated for only a moment before it sank into his chest, and he watched himself rise smoothly from the floor across from him. Daniel saw his own eyes flash, and his blood froze in his veins._

_"No!"_

_None in the room heard Daniel's frantic cry; none saw the telling flash in the blue eyes in front of them. Daniel watched in horror as his hand—a hand that was no longer his own—rose toward Sam. Lightning that rivaled that which accompanied the storm outside flashed from the fingertips, and Sam crumpled to the floor._

"Fear the bliss of sleep, Daniel. Fear the evil that steals your soul even as you dream."

_"No! Stop!"_

_Teal'c raised his staff weapon immediately, but paused in uncertainty. The dark eyes narrowed when Teal'c looked down at Sam's body, and as Daniel stood, frozen in terror, the being that had taken control of his body turned toward the Jaffa. Teal'c was dead before his body hit the floor._

"Fear not what dreams may come; fear the unending darkness that follows after."

_"Damn you!" Daniel screamed at himself across the room. "Damn you, stop this!"_

_"And you will stop me, boy?" his own voice answered him. Daniel shuddered when the creature that had stolen his body turned toward him. He stared back at his own face and saw only the face of a stranger—he looked into his own eyes and saw only eyes that glowed with evil. "What harm can you do to a god?"_

"Challenge him. Defy him."

_The monster knelt beside the one person in the room who still lived, and Daniel stepped forward._

_"Try me."_

_The creature laughed, and Daniel's eyes narrowed in hatred. "They will die believing that you have killed them." The hand that was no longer Daniel's came to rest against Jack's chest, and Daniel imagined that he could feel the heartbeat beneath his own fingers. _

_"Leave him alone," he ordered._

_The monster only laughed again and shook his head._

_Daniel looked down at his hand, and flexed his fingers slowly. He raised his head again when he heard his own voice calling out to him._

_"They will die, young one. They will die by your hand."_

_Daniel shook his head in defiance. "No, they won't."_

_"You cannot stop me."_

_Daniel's body shook, but it was no longer fear that caused him to tremble. Anger ran through his veins, and it fueled a power that Daniel had never felt before. The storm raged outside, and Daniel felt the lightning flowing through him, screaming for release. He looked down at his hand again, and saw the sparks that danced and bristled from his fingertips._

"Listen and understand, Daniel. Only you can stop this from happening. Only you can save them."

_"You will learn too late," the creature said. "You, and your friends, will die."_

_Daniel jerked his head back up when he heard the cry of surprise and pain. Jack writhed on the floor beneath the thing's hand. Blood trickled from the corners of his eyes, from his ears, and from his nose._

"Run, Daniel," _Aynad whispered in his mind. _"You can stop this, if you believe. Go to him. Run."

_"No! Jack!"_

_Daniel moved his legs as quickly as he could, but he came no closer to where Jack lay, dying, gasping in pain and betrayal, naming his murderer with his last breath._

_"Daniel …"_

_"Jack!"_

"Believe, Daniel. Believe in your friends. Make them believe in you. You can stop this. Run!"

_"Jack!"_

- - -

"Jack!"

The terrified cry pulled Jack to his knees at Daniel's side immediately.

"Daniel? Daniel, it's okay. It's over."

"No," Daniel whispered. His voice was filled with a mixture of terror and hatred that Jack couldn't explain. "This can't be real. A dream …"

Sam reached out and placed her hand on Daniel's arm. "Daniel, can you hear me?"

Daniel squeezed his eyes more tightly shut and winced. "Sam?" he asked weakly.

"Yes, it's me," Sam answered.

"Are you awake, Daniel?" Jack asked.

"I killed them," Daniel whispered. "God, I killed everyone."

"Daniel," Sam said soothingly. "No one's dead."

"It's a dream. Has to be a dream. God, it hurts."

"I know how you feel," Jack said softly. "But it's not a dream. You're awake, so open your eyes. It's gonna hurt, so be ready for it. But open them anyway."

Daniel's eyes fluttered a few times before he opened them all the way. He blinked against the light and after a few seconds, he moved his eyes slowly around the room. He found Teal'c first, and then Sam. The expression on his face remained one of fear until he finally focused on Jack.

"Jack?" he asked weakly. "You okay?"

Jack smiled down at him. "I'm fine, Daniel. What about you?"

Daniel tried to lift his head from the pack it rested against, but gasped in pain and fell back heavily. "Oh, ouch."

"Yeah, the headache's a killer," Jack said. "Give it a few minutes."

"I've given it a week already," Daniel answered softly. "I'm beginning to think that it's never going to go away. You'd think that I'd be used to it by now."

Jack glanced up at Sam and Teal'c in concern, and then back down. "Daniel, what are you talking about?"

Daniel's face scrunched up and he appeared to be concentrating. A moment later, he slowly turned his head to look down at first his left shoulder and then his right leg. He closed his eyes and let his head fall back once more.

"Sam, you shot me!"

Sam knelt down quickly and placed her hand on his arm. "I'm so sorry, Daniel, I didn't …"

"She didn't do anything that she wasn't supposed to," Jack put in. "And she didn't shoot us. We just got in the way." Jack tapped Daniel's arm with one finger. "Thank you, by the way."

Daniel opened his eyes again and looked up at Jack in confusion. "Thank me? For what?"

Jack pointed at the bandage on his temple. "Seems your shoulder saved me from getting my brain splattered."

Sam gulped.

"Oh," Daniel answered, though it was clear from his distracted expression that he still didn't understand. "Well, you're welcome, I guess. Any time."

"Do you remember what happened, Daniel?" Sam asked.

"Um … no. Not really. The glyph started to glow, and Jack grabbed my arm …" Daniel's eyes fell closed again as his voice drifted off.

Jack nodded. "Yeah, it'll come back in a bit. I was kind of confused at first too." Jack looked up at Sam and Teal'c and nodded at them. They stood and walked to the stretcher they'd assembled from their supplies while waiting for Daniel to regain consciousness. "We're going to go ahead and get out of here now, Daniel. You're not up to walking back to the gate, right?"

"Strangest dream," Daniel mumbled.

"What's that?" Jack asked.

"I had the strangest dream," Daniel answered. "A voice, a person, speaking Egyptian. He was showing me things, the village, trying to tell me something. He told me to run."

Jack looked up at Sam and Teal'c with raised eyebrows. Sam simply shrugged, and Teal'c shook his head. Jack felt something niggling in his brain, telling him that there was more to Daniel's rambling than there appeared to be. He considered asking Daniel to elaborate, but his practical side won out. His main concern was to get his team packed up and to the stargate—everything else would have to wait.

"Okay, I know you're confused," Jack said. "And I know you're hurting more than a little bit. But I need you to pay attention right now."

Daniel opened his eyes and looked up. "What?"

"We're going back to Earth. To do that, we're going to need to put you on a stretcher, and it's going to hurt." Jack looked down into Daniel's confused eyes. "Hey. You in there?"

"What? Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. It'll hurt. Got it."

Jack nodded slowly and pushed himself to his feet. Teal'c and Sam put the stretcher down on the floor beside Daniel. Teal'c took Daniel's ankles in his hands, while Jack and Sam each took hold of a shoulder.

"On three," Jack said. "One, two, three!"

They lifted as one and forced themselves to ignore Daniel's cry of pain. It took only seconds for them to settle him on the stretcher. Daniel lay there panting as he tried to regain his composure.

"Ouch," he gasped.

"That was the hard part, Daniel," Sam said. "It'll be easier now."

"Good," Daniel said. "Because that really hurt." He closed his eyes again and let his head roll slightly to the side.

"Grab an end, Teal'c," Jack said. "Let's head home."

Jack bent to grab the handles at Daniel's head, and Teal'c bent toward his feet.

"Wait!" Daniel cried out suddenly. His eyes flew open and he shot up from the stretcher. "Jack!"

"Damn it!" Jack called in surprise. He knelt down quickly and grabbed Daniel's shoulders in his hands. "Daniel, calm down. It's all right. I'm right here."

Daniel eyes darted around the room as he grasped Jack's arm weakly. "Not a dream," he gasped. "It wasn't a dream."

"Daniel, it's all right," Sam soothed from behind him. "But you've got to rest now. You just stopped bleeding …"

"Jack, it was real. He's here."

"Who's here?" Jack asked in confusion.

"Belos."

- - -

"It's not being taken as a host, Jack. That's not what the stories are about. They're about Belos."

"You already told me that, Daniel."

"No, Jack, you don't understand."

Jack sighed heavily. It had been almost thirty minutes since Daniel had first started talking about Belos, and he showed no sign that he'd be stopping any time soon. They were only halfway back to the gate, a trip made no easier by Daniel's constant squirming on the stretcher. He'd already managed to reopen his shoulder wound once, and that had cost them ten minutes while Sam had tried to get the bleeding to stop. She'd succeeded and they'd continued, but when Jack looked down at Daniel he could see fresh blood seeping through the bandage again.

"What I understand, Daniel, is that you have got to lie still. You've already reopened that shoulder wound. And if you don't calm down, we're going to sedate you."

Daniel's eyes widened. "No, you can't do that, Jack."

"I can, and I will, if only just to shut you up for five minutes. You've been talking and squirming since you woke up, and you've got to stop. I can't even understand how you're moving at all. I know how much you hurt."

"I can't go to sleep, Jack. It's not safe. He wants my body, don't you see? It's Belos …"

"Daniel, you're not making any sense."

"It happens when you go to sleep. Why don't you understand? He takes you away while you're sleeping. That's what Aynad was talking about. That's why he told me to fear sleep. Belos needs my body, and he'll take it." Daniel lurched upright on the stretcher and turned, grabbing at Jack's jacket frantically. "You can't let me go to sleep! Promise me, Jack. Don't let me go to sleep."

"God, Daniel!" Jack and Teal'c fought to keep the stretcher level despite the sudden shift in weight. They failed.

Daniel tumbled to the ground and landed hard on his injured shoulder. He cried out and grabbed it, hissing as tendrils of pain shot up his back and down his arms.

"Daniel!" Sam fell to her knees at his side and pried his hands away from his bandaged wound. "He's bleeding again," she announced as she reached into her pack for the medical kit. "Colonel, this has got to stop."

"Yeah," Jack agreed as he looked down at Daniel. "It's going to." Jack glanced across at Teal'c, and then down at Sam. The expressions on their faces made it clear that they were in complete agreement with him. "Sedate him."

"No!" Daniel cried out. "No, Jack, please!"

"It's all right, Daniel," Sam soothed. "We don't want to hurt you, but you're agitated. You're hurting yourself."

"Don't give him a full dose," Jack put in. "Just enough to keep him quiet until we get to the gate."

"Yes, sir." Sam pulled the pre-filled syringe from the kit and opened it. Daniel watched her, his eyes wide with fear.

"Jack, no," Daniel begged. "Please. I'll hold still, I promise. I swear. Don't give me that. Sam, please!"

Sam looked up at Jack once more for confirmation. When he nodded his head, she pressed the syringe against the inside of Daniel's arm.

Daniel jerked his arm away. "I said no!"

"Calm down, Daniel," Sam said softly. "You'll be fine. It's just a mild sedative."

"Just a little nap, Daniel," Jack added. He knelt down, grabbed Daniel's arm firmly, and held it immobile while Sam pressed the needle against it. Teal'c knelt on the other side and held Daniel's uninjured shoulder against the ground. "Enough for me and Teal'c to get you though the gate in one piece. That's all."

"No!" Daniel cried out as the needle penetrated his skin.

"Relax, Daniel," Sam said.

"It's for your own good," Jack added.

"You don't understand, Jack," Daniel answered. His words were already beginning to run together, and tears rolled down his cheeks. "He'll come for me, take me away … he'll kill you … Belos …"

"Belos is gone, Daniel," Jack returned.

"He's here," Daniel argued in a voice that was little more than a slurred whisper. "He's waiting. He's coming. He'll take … Believe … believe in me … I can't … I won't … wake … not … no …"

Daniel's eyes slid closed and his arms went limp at his sides.

Jack sighed. "Thank God. How's his shoulder, Carter?"

Sam nodded and stood, dusting the dirt from her knees as she did so. "The bleeding's stopped again. He's fine."

"Good. Teal'c?"

Jack took Daniel's head and shoulders and Teal'c took his feet, and together they placed him back on the stretcher once more. They lifted him from the ground and resumed their hike to the gate.

"Daniel Jackson seemed unusually distressed at the prospect of being sedated, O'Neill," Teal'c said.

"Yeah, well, I'm unusually distressed at the prospect of facing Fraiser if we let him fall off this thing one more time."

"Will he not be angry upon awakening?"

"Oh, I'm sure he'll be plenty ticked off at us. But when that happens, he'll be in the infirmary, and he'll be Fraiser's problem, not ours."

- - -

Aynad and Daniel stood on the vast yellow plain and watched SG-1 walk toward the stargate. Daniel watched his own hand fall limply from the stretcher that carried his body, and he closed his eyes in defeat.

"He understands," Aynad said simply. "He understands what awaits him if he sleeps. Why do they not listen to him?"

"They can't," Daniel answered softly. He lifted his head and stared across the barren landscape at the shadow that hovered near the horizon. He knew with certainty what was happening to SG-1; he knew that they were being manipulated, being convinced that Daniel's words were nothing more than the delirious ramblings of a man in pain. The blending of their minds had made it more difficult for Belos to separate them, true, but it also had the unfortunate side-effect of making it easier for Belos to influence them all in one fell swoop. "They hear him, but they can't listen."

"For what reason?"

Daniel glared at the shadow. Two points of light where eyes would have been flashed, and then faded away.

"We're not the only ones interfering."

"So what are we to do now?" Aynad asked.

"We think up a Plan C."


	5. Chapter 5

- - -

Chapter Five

- - -

"Okay, Teal'c, let's put him down for a minute. Carter, dial us up. Let's get Sleeping Beauty here to the Doc."

Carter moved off toward the DHD, and Jack stretched his arms above his head. "You know, he doesn't look like he weighs that much, does he?" Jack glanced across at Teal'c. He noticed that the Jaffa seemed distracted, and he gripped his weapon and stepped forward. "Teal'c?"

"Something is wrong in this place, O'Neill," Teal'c answered carefully. "I feel as though we are being watched, but there is no one present."

Jack looked around the empty plain; Teal'c was right. The land, flat and vacant, stretched all the way to the horizon. Had there been anyone but the four of them, they would have been immediately visible.

Suddenly, Jack felt a wave of cold wash over him; it chilled him to the core. He shivered, and out of the corners of his eyes he saw Teal'c and Carter doing the same. "What was that?"

Before either of them could answer, Jack felt another sensation building within him—pure, unadulterated terror. There was no rational explanation for it, but he suddenly wanted nothing more than to jump through the gate and be gone from this planet—yesterday.

"Sir!" He heard Sam's frantic shout from behind him. "Daniel!"

Jack pushed the fear aside and looked down to where Daniel lay on the stretcher. Jack's vision began to darken again, and he wiped at his eyes impatiently. He blinked rapidly, but the shadows that danced before his eyes did not fade. Instead, they seemed to grow and merge and change shape. In less than a heartbeat, the darkness had formed a vaguely familiar shape—and it was hovering right over Daniel.

Suddenly, Daniel's eyes shot open and he gasped in a single deep breath. His whole body jerked once violently, slumped back to the ground, and then became completely still. His eyes fell shut as his chest sank slowly, and the sound of the air escaping his lips carried all the way to Jack's ears. The darkness in Jack's vision dissipated and then was gone.

It was then that they all realized that Daniel's chest wasn't rising again.

"No!" Jack cried. He lurched forward and tripped over his own feet, which seemed somehow strangely immobile. He hit the ground with an audible thud and called out to Sam. "Get that damn gate open! Now!" Jack pushed himself to his knees and scrambled forward clumsily—his hands were as awkward as his feet. He heard Carter behind him, pressing the symbols on the DHD rapidly. Teal'c's measured footsteps approached him from the other direction.

Jack reached Daniel's side first, and immediately leaned down. He strained his ears to hear sounds of breaths that he knew Daniel was no longer drawing, and he glanced up at Teal'c.

"Get ready to run," Jack said.

Teal'c assumed Jack's former position at the head of the stretcher, and Jack rose to his knees. He pinched Daniel's nose shut and tipped his head back, leaned down, and blew two even breaths into the younger man's lungs. He straightened back up and pressed two fingers against the side of Daniel's neck to check his pulse.

He didn't have one.

"Damn it!" Jack shouted. "Carter!"

Teal'c looked down in response to Jack's frantic shout, and in front of them the wormhole kawooshed into existence. Carter sent the identification code through as she ran back to her team. She took her place at the end of the stretcher and reached down to grab the handles.

"Wait!" Jack called out. "One second!"

Jack clasped his hands together and pressed down on Daniel's chest five times in rapid succession. He heard and felt the bones snapping beneath his fingers, but forced himself to ignore them. Daniel wasn't breathing and his heart wasn't beating; a couple of broken ribs were the least of his worries.

Jack checked Daniel's pulse again, and again there was nothing.

"Go! Go!" he ordered Carter and Teal'c. They lifted the stretcher between them and bolted for the gate. As they ran, Jack pinched Daniel's nose closed and tipped his head back once more. "Come on, Daniel. Come on!"

Sam slowed her pace slightly as she approached the event horizon. Jack looked up and his mind clicked through the events of the past several moments. He tried to remember where it had all gone so suddenly and horribly wrong, but the memories escaped him. He knew that he had seen something important, a clue as to what had happened to Daniel, but before he could grasp it, it too was gone, and not even the sensation of an absent memory remained.

As he watched Carter disappear into the wormhole, only one thought occupied Jack's mind—Daniel needed help. He knew how he had been injured, and he knew what they had done. No other details of their aborted mission survived.

Determined to give Daniel every chance he could, Jack took a deep breath and exhaled into Daniel's lungs just before they stepped through.

- - -

The first word George Hammond heard when SG-1 exited the gate was the one he always most hoped not to hear.

"Medic!"

Even if Hammond had not known his people so well, he would have thought Sam Carter close to panic. As she continued down the ramp, Hammond understood the reason for her distress. Sam was carrying one end of a stretcher that was rematerializing behind her. First, the occupant's legs came into view, then his chest, then Jack O'Neill leaning down over him, and then Teal'c carrying the other end.

Jack was obviously doing Daniel Jackson's breathing for him.

"Dear God," Hammond muttered as he ran for the stairs.

As the general rounded the corner, he could hear O'Neill's rapid-fire explanation to Dr. Fraiser. "He was wounded; he got agitated. We sedated him to keep him calm. The sedative should have worn off before we got back to the gate, but it didn't. And while Carter was dialing, he stopped breathing. I tried … God, Doc, I swear, I tried, but I couldn't. His heart stopped …"

Janet Fraiser took command of the situation immediately. She climbed up onto the gurney that Daniel had been transferred to and began chest compressions of her own. She took advantage of the few seconds between compressions and shot a glance across her shoulder at the other members of SG-1.

"Colonel O'Neill, I want you to report to the infirmary immediately," she ordered. "Captain Carter, Teal'c, you too."

The gurney, Daniel, and Dr. Fraiser disappeared through the door and into the corridor amidst a rush of hurried, yet controlled, medical personnel.

SG-1 gave no signs that they had heard Fraiser's order and they made no move to follow. In fact, they all seemed strangely frozen in place, staring at the suddenly empty door that their fourth member had just been taken through.

General Hammond was surprised that the three hadn't followed Dr. Jackson's gurney into the corridor, and he walked toward them slowly. He glanced at the door that for some reason seemed to hold their undivided attention.

"Colonel O'Neill? What happened to Dr. Jackson?"

Jack shook his head slowly. "I don't know, sir."

"He was injured," Sam added. "But he was fine. We sedated him because he was agitated." She shook her head and wrinkled her forehead in confusion. "He should have been fine."

Hammond turned back to Jack. "Colonel?"

"I can't explain it, sir," Jack said. "One minute he was fine, and the next he was …"

"Not," Teal'c finished.

Hammond nodded in understanding. "We'll debrief later. For now, I believe that I heard Dr. Fraiser order all three of you to the infirmary."

"General …"

"Colonel." Hammond softened his tone and continued. "He's in the infirmary, Jack. It's the best place for him to be right now. It's also the best place for you to be right now. Go. Get checked out and rest, maybe get something to eat, and let Dr. Fraiser take care of Dr. Jackson."

- - -

Forty-five minutes later, freshly released from the infirmary, Jack led the two remaining members of his team into the Briefing Room.

All three of them had been immediately diagnosed as being in shock. They seemed distracted, distant, they stared blankly into space as though they were seeing something where nothing was. Teal'c was quick to anger, Sam was quick to cry, and Jack was noticeably trembling.

Jack's care had been overseen by one of the nurses, and he sported a fresh, clean bandage on his right temple as evidence of that fact. He'd been prodded and poked a bit more than he felt necessary after he mentioned the staff weapon blast, but the nurse had assured him that his vital signs were within acceptable parameters. His shock symptoms had been treated with efficiency and precision.

Two other nurses had ministered to Sam and Teal'c with offers of warm blankets and sedatives. Sam accepted the blanket, Teal'c did not, and they both categorically refused the sedative.

All three went through the routine of the post-mission physical—MRIs, EEGs, blood tests, cardiac scans, and a normal examination. All three were declared healthy and told that their bodies needed rest.

General Hammond had summoned them to the Briefing Room almost immediately after they'd finished in the infirmary, and he sat in his seat, waiting for them, as they entered.

"Colonel," he said in greeting. "I trust that you and your team are in good health?"

"Um, yeah," Jack answered. He put his hands on the surface of the table and lowered himself slowly into his chair. He glanced up at Sam and Teal'c and watched them take their seats across from him. "Yeah, we're all fine. We still don't know about …"

Jack's voice faded as he stared at the empty chair on his right, the chair that Daniel should have been sitting in, but wasn't. Jack closed his eyes and shook his head as he tried to understand what was going on in his mind. This was far from the first time that Daniel had been unable to attend a debriefing because of injuries, so why was he so upset? They'd heard nothing from the infirmary that gave them any reason to doubt that Daniel would be fine—in fact, they'd heard nothing from the infirmary at all.

"You would think we would have heard something by now," Sam said.

Jack spun to face her and tilted his head in surprise. How could she have possibly …?

"The condition of Daniel Jackson is of primary concern to all of us," Teal'c added. "It is understandable that we are all thinking of him."

Jack turned toward Teal'c slowly and raised his eyebrows. Were they reading his mind? Or were his emotions displaying that clearly on his face?

"You are visibly concerned, O'Neill," Teal'c said. He lowered his eyebrows, giving Jack the impression that even Teal'c was becoming unsettled by his apparent ability to answer Jack's thoughts. "As are we all, I am certain," he continued, though his voice lacked any certainty at all.

For his part, Jack was beginning to find the entire conversation disturbing.

"We just know each other well," Sam said softly. "And we're all worried."

Jack turned back to her, and he made no attempt to hide the shock on his face. Sam's only response was to shrug and look down at the table.

Hammond's expression betrayed nothing of his thoughts on the bizarre conversation taking place before him. He cleared his throat.

"Now that we've established that we're all concerned about Dr. Jackson's condition, let's move on to discussing just what caused it."

- - -

SG-1 fidgeted in their metal folding chairs. It had been more than an hour since they'd burst through the gate, and they knew no more now than they had then.

The debriefing had been short and not overly informative. Hammond had been less than thrilled to learn that Daniel and Jack's injuries had been the direct result of the actions of their teammates. He had calmed considerably after Jack had made it clear that neither Sam nor Teal'c had intentionally wounded them. He had remained calm and understanding throughout the explanations about the sedation and the circumstances that had convinced them it was necessary. He had grown visibly concerned when it came to the events immediately preceding Daniel's respiratory arrest and their subsequent trip through the stargate. Most alarming to Hammond, he'd said, was the fact that none of them seemed to be able to remember exactly what had happened.

Jack shared Hammond's concern on that point. The collective memory of his team was something that Jack had come to depend on greatly in the weeks and months that they had been together. If Jack found himself slightly confused about a detail or two of a mission, he could count on at least one of the others—usually more than one of them—filling in the blanks. The fact that there were gaps in their recollections was alarming; the fact that those gaps occurred in the same places for all three of them was disturbing.

Hammond had ended the debriefing with the recommendation that they rest. He'd scheduled another debriefing for the next morning, in the hope that after a sufficient amount of time had passed, they would have recovered enough from their shock symptoms to fill in those missing pieces.

And so they sat in the corridor outside the isolation room in metal folding chairs that one of the nurses had provided for them. Rather, Jack and Sam fidgeted in the chairs. Teal'c sat on the floor across from them with his legs crossed and his eyes closed.

"How much longer is this gonna take?" Jack wondered out loud.

At that moment, they heard the distinctive sound of Janet's footsteps coming toward them. Jack and Sam turned their heads to face her, and Teal'c rose to his feet smoothly. Janet approached them with steps that seemed too even, too measured, too controlled. Her entire posture seemed to be an exercise in professionalism, which made the effort required of her to maintain it all too evident.

Jack felt his stomach jump into his throat before she said a word.

"No," he whispered fiercely, shaking his head.

"Colonel, I'm …"

"No!" Sam cried out beside him. "No, Doc, that isn't possible."

"Captain …"

Teal'c didn't speak, but his eyes fell closed and he silently shook his head in defiance.

Janet swallowed hard and forced herself back into a detached, professional mode. "We tried everything we could. We exhausted all of our efforts. But the damage was too extensive …"

"No!" Jack jumped to his feet with so much force that the chair slammed into the wall behind him. "No, damn it. He's not dead. He can't be dead. He was awake. He was talking to us. He was fine!"

"He wasn't fine, sir …"

"Oh, my God," Sam gasped. The others in the corridor turned to face her as she covered her mouth with her hand in horror. "We did it, didn't we? We … we killed him."

"Captain …" Janet began.

"We did," Sam argued. She waved her hands frantically as she continued. "He was injured. The beam, the staff weapon, the gunshot wounds … he was hurt too badly. He'd lost blood; he was still bleeding. His heart was too weak. We sedated him. We stopped his heart …"

Jack's knees buckled and he fell heavily into the chair he had leapt from only seconds before. The dull thud of metal striking concrete echoed through the eerily still corridor. "He begged us," he whispered. His voice was empty, as were his eyes. "He knew. He begged me … We didn't listen." He closed his eyes and shook his head slowly, trying to ignore the sudden trembling of his hands. "I didn't listen."

"We killed Daniel Jackson."

Silence descended in the corridor. Teal'c moved across the hall, to the empty metal chair at Jack's right side, and lowered himself slowly into it. Janet watched the three faces across from her—the only word to describe them was desolate. All of them seemed frozen, immobile, numb. They thought they'd killed him. Had they? Janet honestly didn't know.

Daniel didn't seem to have been wounded badly enough to account for his death. The two bullet wounds were uncomplicated. They had been cleaned and bandaged, and they should have healed well. There were some broken ribs and damage to his sternum, from the CPR, but neither his lungs nor his heart had been punctured by them. The only unknown factor was the energy from the staff blast that Colonel O'Neill said had been directed back at them. Neither the colonel nor Daniel had any external burn marks or any other obvious signs of having been shot with a staff weapon, but the colonel's description of it had made it sound as though the beam had actually allowed the energy to penetrate their skin and burn them from the inside out. The colonel showed definite signs of nerve damage, but nothing so serious that the rest of his nerves wouldn't be able to compensate for it. And his cardiac readings were almost normal, with only a few minor anomalies.

Had Daniel's heart been damaged more severely than the colonel's? Had his lungs been weakened? Had the combination of the staff energy and blood loss slowed his heart enough that, when magnified by the effects of a mild sedative, it had simply stopped beating? She wouldn't know for certain until they performed the autopsy. But there was one more thing that had to be done before the autopsy could be started.

"Colonel, Sam, Teal'c … if you want a few minutes with him, you can come with me."

- - -

The isolation room was dark and strangely empty. The lights had been dimmed, and all of the nurses seemed to have vanished. A familiar form lay in the lone bed in the center of the room. His eyes were closed, and there was a plastic tube running from his mouth to a machine on his right. In the near silence of the darkness, only two sounds could be heard—a slight whooshing noise that matched the rise and fall of Daniel's chest, and a faint beeping that sounded in perfect time with the jagged green line on the heart monitor.

Daniel was breathing. His heart was beating.

SG-1 felt their hearts leap into their throats, and they looked at each other in relief.

"He's alive," Sam whispered.

"Daniel Jackson lives."

"Yes! He's back!"

Jack started across the room, but stopped when Janet placed a gentle hand on his arm. He looked down at her, and sad brown eyes looked back at him.

"It's not him, Colonel. It's the machines. He's on life support."

Jack flinched away from Janet's hand as if her fingers burned him where they touched. "No," he hissed. "You hooked him up to a bunch of machines?"

"You have to understand, Colonel, we did everything we could to save him. And in the absence of a DNR …"

"He has one," Jack interrupted quietly.

"What?" Janet stared back at him in shock, but Jack didn't seem to notice. His eyes were locked on the rise and fall of Daniel's chest across the room.

"DNR, that means 'Do not resuscitate,' right? A living will kinda thing? No heroic measures?"

Janet nodded slowly. "Yes, sir."

"He has one. After the whole thing with Nem, and not knowing what to do with his stuff, or even who had to make the decisions …" Jack turned back to Janet slowly. "He signed it two days ago. He filed it right before we left."

Janet's eyes widened, and she felt the blood draining from her face. "Oh, my God," she gasped. "I didn't know. He didn't have one on the day of his pre-mission physical, and I didn't even …" The full extent of her mistake dawned on her in perfect clarity, and as she looked at the three horrified faces in front of her, she realized that they understood it too.

One of them would have to grant consent to turn the machines off.

"Power of attorney?" she asked softly.

The silence was deafening, the intermittent beeping and whooshing of the life support machines unbearable. After a heartbeat that felt like an eternity, the whispered response she had been waiting for was given.

"Me."

Sam's breath hitched in her throat, and Teal'c stiffened visibly behind him. Jack felt their agony as acutely as he felt his own. He knew that it would be difficult for them to stand beside him and watch Daniel die, but he envied them all the same. They would only stand and watch.

The order that would take Daniel's life would come from him.

Janet sighed deeply and closed her eyes. "Colonel, I'm …"

"Don't!" Jack snapped. "Don't tell me you're sorry, okay? I know you're sorry. But at the moment, Doc, I really don't give a damn."

Janet flinched as though Jack had smacked her, and she stepped away from him. She seemed uncertain of where to go or what to do, and under normal circumstances Jack would have felt for her dismay. As it was, Jack could barely stand to look at her. He was going to be forced to order her to kill Daniel, and it was all because of a mistake she had made. With one last glance at SG-1, she walked to the side of Daniel's bed and took up a position beside the machines. She stood in silence and waited.

Sam was trying her best to keep herself together, and Jack appreciated her effort. Even so, her eyes brimmed with moisture and her soft breathing hitched in her throat every few seconds as she swallowed the lump that Jack knew was sitting in the back of her throat—a lump that was identical to the one that was lodged firmly in his. Teal'c was making a better show of being unemotional, but to anyone who knew him well, the depth of his despair was only too obvious. Teal'c's face was calm, but his dark eyes expressed the same sorrow and pain that Jack knew were showing in his own.

"I know this is gonna be hard …" he began, but stopped himself. How did he do this? There were no words that would make what he was about to do, what they were about to watch him do, any easier. So what was the point in trying?

"He doesn't want this," Jack blurted out suddenly. "Machines, tubes, wires … that's all he is now. And he didn't want to be. He never wanted this."

Teal'c nodded solemnly. "It is understandable."

Jack turned to Sam, and he knew immediately what she was thinking. He could see it written so plainly in her eyes. He wanted to do nothing more than tell her to keep her mouth shut—_don't say it, Carter, please_—but he didn't. He had to let her get it out. She needed to say it, and he and Teal'c needed to hear it.

"We have to kill him again," she whispered. Her voice threatened to break with every word. "We already killed him once, and now we have to do it again."

Jack shook his head. "We didn't kill him, Carter. And we aren't going to now."

Jack turned his head and risked a glance across his shoulder. The illusion was so perfect—it would be so easy to believe it. Daniel's heart was beating steadily, and his chest was rising and falling evenly. Blood ran through his veins, and oxygen moved in and out of his lungs. His face had color and looked so peaceful in its repose. He looked for all the world like he was sleeping, only sleeping, and could awaken at any moment. But he never would.

Daniel was dead.

"I killed him," Jack finished softly. "And I have to do it again."

Sam swallowed audibly, and Jack closed his eyes against the ache that pounded behind them. He drew in a quivering breath. His hands were trembling again, and his chest felt as though someone had reached in, wrapped their hand around his heart, and squeezed. He pushed the feelings down, suppressing them to be dealt with later, when he was alone. Once he felt that he had himself and his emotions under control, he lifted his head and opened his eyes. He exhaled sharply and forced his feet to carry him to the side of the bed, to where Daniel's body lay in its perfect imitation of slumber. Jack looked down at Daniel, and then back across his shoulder to where he expected Sam and Teal'c to be.

They weren't there.

Jack spun back toward the door and saw them still standing there. Sam had obviously lost the small amount of control she'd managed to keep before, and Teal'c was attempting to comfort her.

"Carter?" Jack asked softly. He took one small step back toward her. "Sam?"

Sam looked up at him and shook her head. "I can't, sir … I can't do this. I can't watch you do this." She backed away slowly, never taking her eyes from Jack's face. "I'm sorry, sir. I just … I just can't …"

Jack felt a sudden emptiness rip open inside of him as Sam turned on her heel and ran away from the infirmary.

"Sam, no!"

Teal'c looked at Jack, then down at Daniel, and then up again. "I shall go with Captain Carter," he explained softly as he backed toward the door. "To make certain that she is well."

Jack felt the emptiness inside grow wider and deeper as Teal'c quickened his pace, and then Teal'c too was gone.

"Teal'c, wait!"

The only answer Jack received was more of the beeping and whooshing from the machines at Janet's side.

Jack closed his eyes and tried to push the emptiness away. He rubbed his forehead with his fingers as the ache behind his eyes began to throb. Daniel was dead, Carter and Teal'c were gone, and Janet was still standing on the other side of Daniel's bed, looking at him in pity and anticipation. He wanted nothing more than to join Carter and Teal'c, to run from the room as quickly as possible, to allow himself a release for the emotions that were returning to the surface, threatening to dissolve his carefully constructed, and completely superficial, air of control. He refused to give in to the temptation, and steeled himself to give the order that he knew needed to be given. The order that would kill Daniel's body and let him go once and for all. No deposit, no return.

Au revoir, Daniel Jackson.

Daniel wanted this, Jack reminded himself. Daniel deserved this—death with dignity. Daniel trusted him to do this.

Jack looked down at the peaceful face on the pillow, and brushed a stray strand of hair away from eyes that would never open again. "He's not …" Jack swallowed and closed his eyes again. He forced down tears that he would not allow to fall. "He's not in any pain, is he?"

Janet shook her head slowly. "No, sir."

"And you're sure?" Jack had one shred of hope left that some way, somehow, Daniel would manage to pull through. How badly he wanted the illusion of life to be real. "He's never going to wake up?"

Janet shook her head again. "No."

Jack bit the inside of his bottom lip, and once more pushed his emotions as far down as they would go. After a long, shaky breath, he spoke again. "He didn't want this. Machines, and …" Jack sighed. "No, that's not right. He didn't care about what it would mean for him. He didn't want us to have to do this."

Janet nodded. "I know, sir. If I'd known an hour ago …" She stopped and drew in a quivering breath of her own. "I'm sorry."

Jack looked up and opened his mouth to give the order, but the words wouldn't leave his mouth. He felt something, deep inside his mind—something all too eerily familiar. His head was pounding now and his ears were beginning to ring. He looked down at the peaceful face, and found himself somehow surprised that Daniel's eyes weren't open. A glance across at the life support machines served to remind him of just how permanent the situation was. He opened his mouth once more, but again wasn't able to force his tongue to form the words.

"I can't, …" he began. He jumped slightly in surprise at the sound of his own voice. "I can't do this right now." He lifted his head and glanced at Janet across the bed. "Do I have to do this right now?"

"No, sir," Janet answered softly. "But the longer you wait, the harder it will become."

Jack nodded quickly. "Yeah, I just … it doesn't feel right. Not right now. Carter and Teal'c aren't here, and … Can I wait until the morning?"

"Yes, sir. That's all right."

Jack nodded again, and then turned his head quickly back toward Daniel. "But you're sure, right? He's not in pain?"

"No, sir," came the quiet reply. "There's no pain."

"Okay, then." Jack pulled himself up, took a deep breath, and with more surety than he felt said, "In the morning. When Carter and Teal'c can be here … to tell him goodbye …"

Jack spun on his heel and walked out of the room as quickly, and with as much dignity, as possible.

The elevator doors had barely closed behind him before the tears were streaming down his face and he was trying his damnedest to put his fist through the wall.

- - -

By the time Sam reached her lab, tears were streaming down her face, and her harsh breathing was more from the sobs that tore themselves from her throat than from the running. She heard Teal'c walk up behind her and stand in the door, almost as though he were unwilling to intrude on her grief. No … it was their grief.

Daniel was dead.

"What's wrong with me, Teal'c?" she asked without turning around. "Why am I acting like this?"

Teal'c took a moment to close the door quietly, and stepped further into the room. "In what way is your behavior a mystery to you?"

Sam spun suddenly and waved her arms wildly. "All of it! Everything! I know what death is, Teal'c. I'm a soldier; I've lost team members before. I know exactly what it feels like and how to handle it. But this …"

"You believe that your emotions are unreasonable."

"Exactly! I'm crying like a baby, I'm borderline hysterical, and I can't even …" Sam closed her eyes briefly and then opened them to look at Teal'c again. "I can't stand there and watch him die, Teal'c. Not again. I can't do that again."

After a few seconds of silence, Teal'c spoke softly. "Nor can I, Captain Carter."

Sam was shocked. "See, Teal'c, that's not normal. Not for me, and definitely not for you."

"Agreed."

Sam threw her arms up in defeat. "What's going on here, Teal'c? Why can't we do this?"

"I am as perplexed as you, Captain Carter."

"We know this is what he wants … I mean, doesn't want. We were there; we all talked about it. We heard what he said, we watched him sign it, we watched the colonel sign it …" When Sam turned her face back up to Teal'c, her eyes were again filled with tears. "Why can't we do this? And why am I standing here crying when I need to be in the infirmary telling him goodbye?"

"Because you feel that this is one thing you cannot do," Teal'c answered simply. He drew his shoulders up straighter and raised his head. "I am experiencing the same difficulty."

Sam closed her eyes and tried to stop the tears from falling. She failed.

"God, Teal'c, this feels … it just feels so wrong! I know he's dead. We killed him! We're the reason he's dead. I gave him the shot myself, and the whole time, he was looking at me and begging me not to, and I ignored him …" Sam crumpled. Teal'c suddenly appeared at her side, wrapped his strong arms around her and gathered her against his chest. "I killed him, Teal'c. Me. I put that … that damn needle in his arm … I killed him. It was me …"

Sam felt the hair on the back of her neck begin to rise. Her fingers tingled and a familiar, yet different, pressure started to build in her chest. A prickling sensation spread across her back. She heard a ringing in her ears, like the insistent buzzing of an insect, but it was not an uncomfortable sound. It was comforting, soothing, almost forgiving … and strangely familiar.

Sam jerked her head up from Teal'c's chest. "What was that?"

Teal'c looked back down at her and raised an eyebrow. "I said nothing."

"I thought I felt … I mean, I heard …" Sam felt her chest suddenly filled with an overwhelming sense of hope, and she pressed on. "Is it possible, Teal'c …? What if we're …? Could Daniel be …?"

Sam felt Teal'c shaking his head. "I am sorry, Captain Carter. Daniel Jackson is dead."

Sam slumped back against Teal'c again. The hope was gone, having been smothered by a rapidly descending sense of desolation. She nodded slightly. "I know he is, Teal'c. I know."

Teal'c tipped his head to the side and strained his ears. The only sounds that came back to him were the sounds of Sam's lab and her shaking breath. He too had thought that he had heard something, a buzzing or humming noise, but he dismissed it. His emotions were far more intense than he was accustomed to, and it was beginning to have an effect on his symbiote. The Goa'uld larva in his belly squirmed and wiggled, causing Teal'c's unease to grow. He needed to kel-no-reem, and he needed to do it soon. He worried, though, that even that might not be enough to clear his mind.

"Daniel Jackson is dead," he repeated softly.

Teal'c tightened his arms around Sam's sobbing shoulders, leaned his cheek against the top of her head, and closed his eyes.

The buzzing, humming, ringing sound in their ears faded away.


	6. Chapter 6

- - -

Chapter Six

- - -

_"Aynad? Can you hear me?"_

_Daniel had never attempted such long-distance communication with his friend and companion before. He knew that they could hear each other from the gate to the temple because they had done that before, but from the temple all the way to Earth? It was a long-shot. The entire plan was risky, but when Daniel had realized that Belos was preventing them from reaching SG-1 through all other channels, he'd known there was no other choice._

_He and Aynad had split up, something that none of the other ten had ever done. Aynad had gone with the twelfth Daniel Jackson, to protect him and to teach him what he could in the short amount of time they had to work with, and the eleventh Daniel Jackson had gone off on his own, to do what he could to thwart Belos' plans. They had planned to communicate with each other as often as possible, but neither of them had known if it would even be possible._

_"Aynad?"_

_"It is good to hear your voice, my friend," Aynad finally answered._

_Daniel allowed himself the time for a sigh of relief before asking the questions that he needed the answers to. Those answers would determine exactly how he proceeded from this point._

_"Do you have him with you, Aynad?" Daniel asked. "Did you get him away?"_

_"He is here," Aynad answered._

_"And Belos?"_

_"He did not follow," Aynad said. "We are safe from him, for the moment. But should he find a way to follow us …"_

_"I know, Aynad," Daniel interrupted. "Believe me, I know."_

_There was a short silence as Aynad considered his next words, and Daniel was certain that he knew what they would be. They'd had this conversation before they had separated._

_"I do not believe that acting in the manner we did was wise, my friend. We should have proceeded in the usual fashion. We should have stayed together."_

_Daniel shook his head. "No, we did the right thing. This situation isn't the normal one. The fact that I still exist means that Belos hasn't won yet. We can still stop him." Daniel looked around at the familiar surroundings for a moment, repeating his last statement in his mind until he'd almost convinced himself again. Things were not proceeding quite as smoothly as he'd believed they would, and he was beginning to fear that nothing he did would make any difference. He couldn't even… However, following that line of thinking to its logical end or sharing his misgivings with Aynad wouldn't do any of them any good, so he changed the subject._

_"How is he?"_

_He heard Aynad sigh, a sound that was strange to his ears. The alien man was definitely beginning to adopt the habits of the human he'd found himself sharing the same three weeks with over and over again._

_"He is confused," Aynad said. "I have not yet had a chance to fully explain the situation; he is convinced that I am nothing more than a dream. He is weak, of course; his injuries are great. But he is as strong as you, my friend. And he fights alongside of us even now, though he does not understand what it is he is fighting for."_

_"You'll get through to him," Daniel said._

_"I think it more likely that he will attempt to develop his own theories to explain what has happened to him."_

_Daniel chuckled. "I did that."_

_"You think it odd that he would act in the same manner?" Aynad asked, his tone light. "You are, after all, the same man."_

_Daniel shook his head as memories of the last three weeks of his existence crashed down around him – watching Belos kill Sam and Teal'c without so much as a thought, listening to Belos taunt him before he did the same to Jack, hearing his own voice make an promise to a dying man who couldn't even hear him, _"This won't happen again, Jack. I swear to you, this will never happen again…_"_

_"No, Aynad, we're not the same man. He has never lost them, the way I did. And he never will."_

_"My friend, I am afraid that I must end this conversation," Aynad said suddenly. "Daniel is alone, and frightened, and I must go to him. I must make him understand, if he is to do what needs to be done."_

_"Go then, Aynad. He needs your help."_

_"You will be well in what it is that you do, my friend?"_

_"I'll be fine, Aynad. I'll contact you again as soon as I can."_

_"Be well, Daniel," Aynad said._

_"You too, Aynad. Take care of him, so he can protect them when the time comes." _

- - -

Jack's sleep was slow in coming, and fitful when it finally did arrive. There was no respite for him in it. The dreams, when they came, did nothing to soothe him. His mind was filled with visions of Daniel, alive and well, years in the future. Daniel—smiling beside his wife and laughing with his children. But these things would never come to pass. In the back of his mind, coloring and distorting the glimpses of the future that Daniel would never have, the memory of Daniel drawing his last breath remained. Daniel's eyes, filled with pain and panic as he begged them not to sedate him. Daniel's unheeded pleading to let him stay awake. Daniel imploring them to believe him, to believe in him. Daniel, knowing then what they all knew now—if he went to sleep, he'd never wake up.

And through it all, Daniel's voice, indistinct and echoing in his dream, was filling his mind with absolution, even now.

_"I don't blame you, Jack."_

Jack swallowed hard. He did not deserve Daniel's forgiveness and he would not accept it, but he did not reject it. He concentrated on the voice behind the words and tried to burn it as deeply into his memory as was possible. He knew that eventually he would forget what Daniel's voice had sounded like; he wanted to remember it for as long as he possibly could.

_"And I don't know why I'm even telling you. It won't make you feel any better. It's not like you can hear me, after all. No one can. If you could, you'd have heard me screaming in the isolation room."_

_"Daniel …"_

_"I don't even really know why I'm here. I thought I had it all figured out, but I was wrong. I was so wrong. And we're both going to pay for my mistake."_

The visions, future and past, faded, and Jack found himself standing alone in darkness, with nothing but his dream of Daniel's voice for company. "_You didn't kill me, Jack. I know you can't hear me, but please, tell Sam and Teal'c that you didn't kill me. No one killed me."_

_"God, Danny, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."_

_"It's not your fault, Jack."_

Jack felt the tears rolling down his cheeks, though he knew his body was still sleeping. He felt disconnected, trapped somewhere between the dream and reality, and Daniel's voice was so clear now—almost as if he were standing right behind him. Jack turned around, and the fog-filled blackness faded away.

Jack smiled.

_"Hey, Daniel."_

_"Jack?"_

_"So now I'm talking to your ghost?"_

"_No, Jack. I'm not a ghost." _The dream-Daniel's voice sounded somehow hopeful, whereas before it had sounded resigned. "_It's me. It's really me. Can you hear me? See me?"_

Jack's mind tried to believe what the dream-Daniel was saying to him, but he was unable to argue with the truth of what he had seen in the infirmary._ "I'm hallucinating … dreaming. You're not real. You're dead."_

"_No, Jack," _the dream-Daniel answered. He pushed his hair behind his ears impatiently, and his voice became insistent. "_It's me. I'm real. I'm not dead. I'm still alive, and oh, God, Jack, you can hear me! I'm here!"_ Dream-Daniel extended his hand toward Jack imploringly. "_Help me! Please!"_

Jack felt his heart jump into his throat. Could it be true? Could the body in the infirmary, the one that lived and breathed only because of machines, be a lie?

_"How …?"_

_"I'm alive, Jack. I'm here. I can't explain what's going on, but don't let them kill me. Believe in me! Please!" _The voice sounded so full of pain, so desperate.

Jack reached out blindly into the suddenly swelling darkness of his dream. "_Daniel …" _

"_Jack!" _The blackness continued to grow, and Jack stepped forward, still reaching out for the dream-Daniel's outstretched hand. A huge black shadow loomed behind Daniel's back, and before Jack could shout out a warning, it had wrapped itself around Daniel's chest and arms and was pulling him into itself. "_Jack, help me!"_

_"Daniel?"_

_"Believe in me!" _Daniel's cry echoed in Jack's mind as the blackness swallowed him completely.

"Daniel!"

Jack was sitting straight up in his bunk with his eyes wide open. His heart pounded in his ears and his breath came in ragged gasps. He could feel the drying tears on his cheeks.

"Colonel?"

The soft voice at the door was followed by an impossibly loud knock.

"O'Neill? Are you unwell?"

Jack shook his head quickly to clear it and wiped the last remnants of tears from his face as he pushed himself to his feet. "I'm fine, Teal'c," he answered. He walked to the door and pulled it open. "It was …" Jack trailed off, and turned his thoughts inward again. Daniel wasn't dead? Was it possible? Could it be true?

"Sir?" Sam's soft voice pulled Jack's attention back to his teammates standing in front of him. Their faces looked as haggard as he imagined his to be, and he could tell that their night hadn't been much easier than his had been. The fact that they were standing outside his door told him that they'd already been to the infirmary, so they knew that he hadn't given the order yet. The dream came back to him in vivid detail, and he couldn't help but wonder—had they seen Daniel too? But if they had, there would be hope on their faces, wouldn't there?

There was nothing there—nothing there but pain and desperation.

"A dream," Jack whispered. He shook his head slowly and felt the last vestiges of hope escape him. He lowered his head and fixed his eyes on the floor as a new sense of dread gripped his heart. "It was just a dream."

The three of them stood in the silent corridor, looking at each other. No one spoke, but each knew what the others were feeling. None of them wanted to do what they all knew needed to be done. Daniel was gone; the only thing left of him was the body in the infirmary—a body with an artificial heartbeat and lungs that only moved because a machine forced oxygen into them. Officially it fell to Jack O'Neill to make the decision, but they would all do it together.

Their last act as SG-1 would be to let Daniel go.

Sam drew a deep, shaking breath and looked across at Jack. "Sir?"

Jack nodded, and looked from Sam to Teal'c and back again. "Yeah."

Jack took a ragged breath and steeled himself against the inevitable. Without another word, he turned and headed toward the infirmary. He didn't turn to see if Sam and Teal'c had followed him; he could feel them behind him. He imagined that he felt Daniel back there with them, pleading with them to stop … but it had been a dream.

Nothing but a dream.

There would be no reprieve for SG-1 this time. There was no Goa'uld waiting in orbit to bring Daniel back from the dead. There were no Nox to revive him. No implanted memories of his demise, no hypnosis-induced answers to his fate, and no fish-men to return him to them.

Daniel was dead. And it was time to let him go.

- - -

Jack stood at attention at Daniel's side, with Teal'c and Sam on either side of him. General Hammond stood equally as rigid at the foot of the bed; his bloodshot eyes betrayed the fact that he hadn't slept much more than SG-1 had. Janet stood across from them, her hands clasped in front of her. The machines responsible for the illusion of life in Daniel's body beeped rhythmically beside her.

The sound of General Hammond clearing his throat shattered the solemn silence of the room. Only Janet turned toward him.

"There are no words that will give comfort at a time like this," Hammond began softly. "We know the risks we take every day, and we say we accept them. We say we understand them, but when we lose someone we've grown close to, we realize that we could never be prepared for the reality of it." Hammond swallowed hard before continuing. "Dr. Jackson gave his life in the pursuit of knowledge, and to help preserve the future of this planet." The silence that descended again was broken by a quiet, emotional, "We'll miss you, son."

Janet gently laid her hand on Daniel's arm and forced herself to smile down at him. "Goodbye, Daniel."

Teal'c drew himself up to his full height before bowing deeply to the body of his friend. "You have been our friend, Daniel Jackson, and we are grateful for that. Your presence here will be sorely missed."

Sam was shaking and tears were rolling down her cheeks as she leaned forward to press her lips gently against Daniel's forehead. "We're so sorry, Daniel," she managed through her tears. "We'll miss you so much."

Jack waited for Sam to straighten back up before taking one step forward. He looked down at Daniel, and felt dread again building in his chest. He swallowed the emotions that threatened to steal his voice and forced himself to speak. "We'll find her for you, Daniel," he promised softly. "We won't stop looking." Jack absently brushed the stray hairs away from Daniel's forehead, and then chuckled lightly. "You never could keep that hair out of your eyes, could you?"

A memory flashed in Jack's mind, an impression of Daniel impatiently tucking his hair behind his ears. "_Jack, it's me. I'm real. I'm not dead …" _

Jack jumped back to reality with a start. It had been a dream—wishful thinking—just a dream.

Jack heard Sam's quiet sobs behind him, and he raised his eyes to meet Janet's. He glanced back down at Daniel's face once more, closed his eyes, and nodded.

All at once, Jack's mind exploded. He saw everything that was happening around him with perfect clarity. The world moved in slow motion, and Jack saw it all as if he were seeing through two sets of eyes—his own and Daniel's, just as it had been when they'd been trapped in the beam together. Sam and Teal'c seemed frozen in the moment, and both of their faces were suddenly devoid of color. Jack could see their lips moving, both mouthing Daniel's name as if in a dream … the dream …

"_No!" _Jack heard in his mind. "_God, Jack, no!"_

Janet's hand was moving toward the switch that would turn off the machines that kept Daniel's body alive; her finger inched ever closer to its unacceptable destination.

Jack could see his own face, and Carter's and Teal'c's, from across the bed. He saw the room as it would appear to someone standing at Janet's right side, but the mixed perspectives didn't confuse him. They seemed to lay over each other perfectly, and Jack's mind saw the differing points of view as two puzzle pieces that had fallen into place. Each perspective lacked details that the other had, and they fit together seamlessly.

Jack lifted his head and found himself staring directly into his own eyes—eyes that stared back at him from the other side of the bed, eyes that didn't belong to him, but were still his.

_"Daniel?"_

_"Believe in me, Jack!"_

"No!" Jack cried out suddenly. He lunged forward across the bed, reaching out for Janet's hand with no hope of actually touching her. "Stop!"

Janet froze in place; her fingers hovered barely an inch above the switch. "Colonel?"

"Don't do it!" Jack ordered. He pushed his way past Teal'c, and ran around the end of the bed, past a stunned George Hammond. "Doc, don't turn those machines off. Don't kill him."

"Colonel O'Neill?" Hammond asked. "What are you doing?"

Jack skidded to a stop at Janet's side and turned to look back at his commanding officer. "I'm not quite sure I know, sir. But we can't do this."

"But, Colonel …" Janet began.

"He's not dead, Doc," Jack said. All at once he felt the despair and dread that had gripped his heart disappear. He felt hope return and he knew without question that he was right. It was true. Somehow, some way … it was true.

"Daniel's not dead."

- - -

"Colonel, he's dead," Janet insisted. "There is absolutely no way for him to recover from this."

"I know that," Jack said. "I know. His body's dead. I can see that. But his mind is alive."

"Colonel, he's dead," Janet repeated.

"Enough!" Hammond nearly bellowed. "This argument is pointless. Doctor, is there any possibility that Dr. Jackson might be able to recover?"

"No, sir," Janet answered with a shake of her head. "Absolutely not. If it weren't for the life support, he'd have died last night."

"All right. Colonel O'Neill, do you grant consent for the termination of Dr. Jackson's life support?"

"No!" Jack answered. "Not while he's still alive."

"Then it would seem that we have ourselves a standoff," Hammond observed. He rose from the chair he'd fallen into after Jack O'Neill's pronouncement. "Dr. Fraiser, a word, if you please."

Janet nodded and led the way out the door. She motioned the general out ahead of her and then turned back to Jack. "Think about what you're doing, Colonel. Please." The door closed behind them, and they were gone.

"O'Neill, your behavior has become most disturbing," Teal'c announced.

"Colonel, you can't do this to him!" Sam declared at the same time.

Jack sighed and turned back to them, unable to conceal the hopeful smile. "But he's alive. His mind, his heart, everything he is—he's still alive. Why would you want me to kill him?"

"He's already gone, sir," Sam insisted. "You have got to let him go."

"It is Daniel Jackson's right to leave this life in a dignified manner."

Jack nodded quickly. "Yeah, well it's also his right to decide if he's not quite ready to do that yet, isn't it?"

"Colonel, he can't decide that for himself. He trusted you to do it for him."

"Yes, he did. And right now, he's trusting me not to."

"What?"

"That dream I had, Carter, the one I was talking about this morning … it wasn't a dream. It was real. He … I don't know … projected himself or something, into my dream. Daniel's alive. He's here. And he needs our help."

"To do what?" Sam asked.

"I don't know. He didn't have a chance to tell me, but it's him. His body is dead, but his mind's still alive. I think maybe he's trapped; he can't get out. Now I don't know if there's a way to save his mind right now, there might not be one, but if we turn those machines off, we'll kill him for sure."

Sam shook her head sadly and looked away. Teal'c placed his hand on her arm, and turned toward Jack.

"Yes, Daniel Jackson is indeed here." Teal'c walked to the side of the bed. He looked down at the lifeless form, closed his eyes, and bowed his head slightly. "Daniel Jackson is just here, in this bed. The life has fled from his eyes and his heart has ceased to beat on its own. If it is only his body of which you speak, O'Neill, then yes, he is here." Teal'c raised his head, and Jack thought he glimpsed a shadow of a tear in his eyes. "But this body is not Daniel Jackson, and this I believe you know."

"I'm not talking about his body, Teal'c," Jack answered softly. "I know it's dead. Haven't I said that? It's dead; he's alive. His mind is still alive." He looked back and forth between his two distraught teammates. He knew how hard this was for them to believe. He'd talked to Daniel, had actually seen him, and he'd had a hard enough time believing it himself. "Look, I know it sounds crazy. And no, I can't explain it. I don't know what happened—Daniel doesn't seem to know either. But I do know he's here. I can …" Jack fumbled for the words that would make them understand. "I can hear him, in my mind. I can't see him right now, but I did last night, and I know he's here. I can … feel him …"

Sam blanched; Teal'c froze; Jack noticed.

"You felt him too!"

"Colonel …"

"You did!" Jack insisted. "The looks on your faces … When Janet was about to flip that switch, I saw you, both of you. He was screaming for me to help him, and you felt him."

Sam shook her head sadly. "I really wish I had, Colonel."

"Indeed. The only feelings I felt at that time were my own."

"No," Jack replied, shaking his head. "No, that was him. That … that fear, that pain, that despair … that was Daniel."

"It was my pain, Colonel," Sam returned hotly. "My fear and my despair. It was hard enough to do it the first time, sir. Why are you making us go through it all again?"

"Because we don't have to go through it at all, Carter. Daniel is alive."

"No, Colonel," Hammond contradicted from Fraiser's door. "Daniel is dead."

Before Jack had a chance to argue further, Janet emerged from behind the general. "Colonel, there's something I need to show you." Jack, Sam, and Teal'c watched as Janet grabbed a monitor from against the wall and wheeled it to the side of Daniel's bed. "This is an electroencephalogram," she explained. "An EEG. It monitors brain activity." Silence reigned as Janet pressed five electrodes against Daniel's forehead and taped them into place. When she'd finished, she looked up at the three faces watching her intently from across the bed. With a deep sigh, she reached over and turned the machine on.

A flat green line appeared on the screen, accompanied by a low whine.

Jack had seen a line exactly like that once before, standing in an emergency room with his wife two years earlier, and he knew exactly what it meant. He shook his head in denial. Beside him, Sam stumbled slightly and Teal'c closed his eyes and lowered his head.

"He's been like this since he got here last night, Colonel. I'm sorry."

Jack stared at Fraiser with an expression that demanded an answer. "Why didn't you tell me before?"

The answer came not from the doctor, but from the general behind him. "We thought it would be easier for you if you didn't know, Jack."

"Easier," Jack repeated. The hope and certainty he had felt only moments before had vanished, and in its place was only the numbness that accompanied a sudden and irrefutable loss. "Easier how? When it was just his body that was dead, there was a chance, wasn't there? A really, really small one, but a chance. But this isn't his body." Jack glared at the flat line on the monitor accusingly, almost as if he could make it take back what it was saying about Daniel. "He's brain dead. Even if we could get his body back …"

"I'm sorry, Jack," Hammond said softly.

"I'm …" Jack faltered. He knew that he'd been about to say something, but he couldn't remember what it might have been. His mind suddenly felt as empty as Daniel's. "I'm gonna fall over now."

Teal'c caught him before he did. Sam stepped up beside him, and together they managed to lower him into the chair at the foot of Daniel's bed. They stood beside him with their hands on his shoulders protectively, and Jack knew that those hands were the only things keeping him upright.

There was a flurry of activity near the door, but Jack didn't see it. To him, it seemed the entire universe had narrowed to include nothing and no one, save himself, Sam and Teal'c's hands, and Daniel's body in the bed in front of him. An impossible amount of time passed in what seemed to be less than a heartbeat, and Jack felt Teal'c and Sam help him to his feet. They moved him toward the bed that had been brought into the room, and helped him lie down on it.

Janet slipped up behind him and inserted the needle into his arm before he even realized that she was there.

"I'm sorry," Jack whispered as Janet pulled the sheet up and over him. "Sam, Teal'c … Daniel … I'm so sorry."

"It's all right, sir," Sam answered. She reached up and impatiently wiped at the tears that rolled silently down her face.

"You require rest, O'Neill," Teal'c said. "When you awaken, your mind will once again be clear."

Jack nodded as Sam and Teal'c moved away. He heard their footsteps join Hammond's as the three of them walked out of the isolation room and into the corridor. He heard Janet's heels clicking against the floor as she followed them. He didn't move. He lay perfectly still, his eyes fixated on the deceptively peaceful face on the pillow across from him.

"Sorry, Danny," he whispered as his eyes fell closed. "So … so sorry …"


	7. Chapter 7

- - -

Chapter Seven

- - -

"Jack?"

_The end of his search, and yet only the beginning … _

_But his only hope of saving her had been destroyed as suddenly as it had been discovered … _

_No. No, that wasn't right. Jack hadn't destroyed the Hammer. Daniel had done that at Jack's order, because it had been the only way to save Teal'c._

"Jack!"

_The secrets of the universe swirled above his head—the undeniable truth of their existence … _

_But he had turned his back and walked away … _

_No, Jack hadn't walked away from anything. Jack had made Daniel walk away, because the alternative had been completely unacceptable._

"Jack, can you hear me at all?"

_He could have taken her to the Hammer and driven the demon from her eyes, but he had destroyed it. He could have studied the writings at Heliopolis and learned from them how to save her, but he had walked away and let them fall into the ocean … _

_What was happening to him? Was he losing his mind? These weren't his thoughts; these weren't his feelings. This wasn't his dream._

_This was Daniel's nightmare._

"Jack, wake up! Please!"

_He couldn't seem to get his thoughts in order any more. Where did he end and Nem begin? Where did Earth and Oannes diverge? Were Sha're and Omaroca bound to the same fate? What had become of Belos?_

_As his confusion grew he heard a pounding, a beating as if of his own heart. But it was too loud, too slow, and out of sync with the pounding he felt in his head. His mind swam, then filled, then exploded with pain._

"Oh, God!"

"Jack!"

Jack sat bolt upright on the bed, his eyes wide and unseeing.

"What the hell was that?" he demanded of no one.

"Jack? Jack, are you with me?"

Jack turned his head slowly toward the voice, almost afraid to see who he knew would be standing beside him.

"I'm still dreaming."

"No," Daniel insisted, shaking his head. "No, you're not dreaming. This is real, Jack. I am real."

"You're not real. You're a figment of my imagination or something." Jack threw his legs over the side of the bed and jumped to his feet. He walked across to where Daniel was standing, next to his own dead body. Jack narrowed his eyes and leaned forward to challenge his dream. "I'm making you up."

"Okay, I know this is confusing, and more than a little frightening. But you have to believe me, Jack. This is real."

"I'm losing my mind. I have to be." Jack turned his back on Daniel and closed his eyes.

"Jack, I really need you to listen to me, okay?"

"I'm nuts. Insane. Cracked. Out of my head. Loonier than a toon. Battier than a belfry …"

"Come on, Jack. Don't do this. Please. I need you."

Jack actually giggled as he leaned back against his bed. "You need me. Oh, that's great. The dead guy needs me." Jack shook his head. "I've completely snapped."

"No!" Daniel forced himself to calm down when he saw Jack flinch back from the sound of his voice. "No, Jack, you haven't snapped. But I'm about to. Please, Jack … I need you to be here for this. You've got to listen to me."

"Can't listen to a dead man, Danny. Nope nope nope … ya really can't."

"Jack, I am not dead. At least, not yet anyway. I need you to help me."

"Guess who died on the planet today? Daniel! Daniel!"

Daniel nearly roared in frustration as Jack sang out the words. "No, Jack, damn it, why? Why?! Why won't you listen to me!"

"Because you're dead!" Jack returned fiercely, suddenly lucid again. "You are dead. Fraiser showed me the squiggly things …"

"EEG readings," Daniel offered.

"… or, to be more precise, the distinct lack of squiggly things! Your brain is shut off! Your heart and your lungs are running on machines! You're dead, Daniel!" Jack sat down heavily on the bed and buried his head in his hands. "Damn it, Daniel … you're dead."

"No," Daniel replied, shaking his head. "I'm not."

"You are so."

"Am not."

"Are too."

"Am not."

"Are."

"Not!"

"Damn it, Daniel!"

"Jack, look at what you're sitting on," Daniel said suddenly.

Jack raised his head and looked at Daniel in confusion. "Now what does that have to do with anything?"

"Just look, Jack."

With a sigh that made it very clear he was only humoring his own hallucination, Jack turned his head and looked down at the surface beneath him. It was a bed in the isolation room—the same bed he himself had just risen from. "Yeah, it's a bed. And?"

"And what's in it?"

Jack let his eyes wander across the bed, noticing for the first time the distinctly human shape under the sheet. When his eyes finally settled on the face that went with that shape, he froze.

Then he jumped as far away from it as he could.

"Holy crap!" Jack leaned forward from his new position and studied the bed in front of him. Not only had he been sitting on his bed in the isolation room, he'd also been sitting on his own legs. "What the … am I dead too?"

"Are you?"

Jack thought about that for a moment. He didn't feel dead. After all, he'd been dead before; he knew what it felt like, and he knew that this wasn't it. "No," he answered with certainty, shaking his head. "No, I'm not."

"Am I?"

The voice was filled with patience and understanding, but when Jack looked into Daniel's eyes, he saw only pain and despair. Something had happened on that planet—of that there could be absolutely no doubt. It had been something terrible, and the true depths of it were written there in the clear blue of Daniel's eyes. But for that moment, whatever it was really didn't matter. Whatever it was they could beat it; they could fix it.

Daniel wasn't dead.

"Are you with me, Jack? Because I really need your help here."

Jack looked away from Daniel. He felt the void in his chest, the large piece that he'd felt missing in himself since he'd first watched Daniel draw his last breath on the planet, filling back up again. It didn't disappear entirely, but he convinced himself that it would be gone once Daniel was whole again. He allowed only a second for the relief to flood over him before it was replaced with a new sense of urgency. Whatever had happened to Daniel on that planet was still happening, and they had to stop it.

"Tell me what I need to do."

- - -

Janet was sitting in the observation room above when Jack began to stir. She had expected him to wake up slowly, possibly confused, most certainly still groggy. The last thing she had expected was for him to shoot up from his bed, fully awake, and launch himself to Daniel's side.

"Are you still here?" she heard him ask no one. She leaned forward in surprise, only to lean back again when she heard him say, "Good. Because I'm really going to need you to talk me through this."

Janet turned to reach for the phone to call General Hammond; she froze in place as the one-sided conversation continued.

"I still say this isn't going to work. Fraiser already thinks I'm half-nuts from you being dead. If I tell her what you just told me, she's going to think I've gone all the way." Janet turned her head slowly, expecting to see Jack still leaning down over Daniel's body. She had barely registered that his gaze was higher than she expected it to be when she heard the muttered, "Damn it, Daniel!"

Janet jumped from her chair and ran out the door before she heard Jack say another word.

- - -

"I listened to you. Now you need to listen to me."

"Jack, there's no time! You've got to tell General Hammond now!"

"Why can't we just slow things down a bit here? You've left a few big gaps in your story. Like how can I see you now? I couldn't see you an hour ago. And I'm guessing that I'm the only one who can now. How do I explain that without making it sound like I'm nuts?"

"I don't know."

"Daniel …"

"No, Jack, I swear. I have no idea. When I was talking to you last night, I didn't know you were actually going to hear me. I was just talking, trying to keep myself from going crazy. I don't know why you could hear me then, and I don't know why you can see me now."

"Okay, well, see … that's just not gonna fly, Daniel. There has to be a reason."

Daniel rolled his eyes. "I know there has to be a reason. I just don't know what it is."

Both men stood in silence, staring at each other as if doing so would give them the answer. Suddenly, both of their eyes widened, and they opened their mouths to speak in unison.

"The beam!"

"That's got to be it," Daniel continued. "We could read each other's minds. We're connected somehow now … our minds, I mean …"

"So what about Carter and Teal'c?" Jack asked. "They were in that thing with us for a while. And I know they can feel you, even though they won't admit it. Can they hear you too?"

Daniel opened his mouth to answer, then closed it and shrugged instead. "I don't know. I haven't really tried."

"Well, do you think maybe that might be a good idea?" Jack asked. "They're not going to see me as exactly objective here, and they already think I'm going nuts. Because I'm the one that's supposed to … disconnect you."

Daniel looked up, his eyes suddenly wide. "Jack, you can't!"

"I know that, Daniel," Jack answered softly. "I'm not planning on it." Jack took a step closer to Daniel. "I'm not going to let anyone kill you, Daniel. I swear it."

"Colonel O'Neill?" Janet's voice behind him caused Jack to start in surprise. "Colonel, I want you back in bed."

Jack turned to find not only Dr. Fraiser, but Sam and General Hammond, standing just a few feet away, standing so close to Daniel that Sam was almost standing on him.

"Jack, you can't!" Daniel pleaded.

"I can't!" Jack echoed forcefully.

"Colonel, you need your rest," Janet insisted.

"No, …" Daniel breathed.

"It's all right. I'm not going back to sleep."

"Sir?" The question came from Sam. "Who are you talking to?"

"She can't see me, Jack."

"Of course she can't see you! I knew that part already. I couldn't see you either, until a few minutes ago. We already talked about this, remember?"

"Colonel?" It was Hammond's turn to voice his concern. "Who are you talking to?"

"Daniel," he answered simply. He realized immediately upon seeing their faces that it had been exactly the wrong thing to say, and he heard Daniel smack himself in the forehead behind him. Jack sighed and tried to climb out of the hole he'd just dug himself. "It's a long story, General. And it's one that I've told Daniel he's going to need to gather some corroboration for, since you all think I'm nuts and you won't believe a word I say."

"Jack, will you stop being a jackass and just tell them?"

"I'm going to tell them, Dr. Jackson, thank you. I am going to tell them that you're still alive, and that we have to take your body back to the planet so you can figure out how to get back in it. And I am not a jackass!"

Jack read all of the faces in the room almost instantly. Daniel's clearly showed his desperation. Janet, Sam, and Hammond all shared an expression that made their feelings on the matter perfectly clear.

"Okay," Jack began, turning to face them directly. "Let me start by saying that I am not nuts, and I am not hallucinating …"

- - -

"General, it would almost certainly have to be an hallucination."

Hammond leaned back in his desk chair as he tried to make sense of what had happened earlier in the infirmary. He and Dr. Fraiser had moved their discussion into his office after Colonel O'Neill had sworn not to do anything foolish with Dr. Jackson's body. Captain Carter had stayed behind to make certain he kept that promise.

"See … it's the 'almost' part that's stopping me from just agreeing with you, Doctor."

"Sir?"

"Well, 'almost certainly' has never been enough before—not where SG-1 is concerned. They've all been 'almost certainly' dead before, hell, they've all been certainly dead before, but they're all still alive."

"But, General, there is no 'almost' in regards to Daniel's condition. He is brain dead. No brain activity at all for more than twelve hours, all autonomic functions shut down …"

"But, Doctor," Hammond interrupted with a tired smile, "if what Colonel O'Neill is saying is true, then even Dr. Jackson's current state is not irreversible."

"General, it is not possible to come back from the dead."

Hammond simply looked at her.

"Point taken, sir."

"When dealing with aliens, Doctor, or when dealing with SG-1, most particularly when dealing with aliens and SG-1, it's best not to consider anything impossible."

"In that case, General, the colonel's story is possible, however unlikely. The more likely scenario is that Colonel O'Neill is suffering from stress-induced hallucinations as a direct result of being informed of Daniel's condition."

"Why would Dr. Jackson's condition cause Colonel O'Neill to hallucinate?"

"Because, sir, the question of whether or not to continue the life-support falls on his shoulders, and his alone. Add to that the events of last week, and the fact that all of SG-1 believe that the sedative they gave him is what killed him in the first place … General, he was upset last night, but I thought he was willing to terminate the life support. Something happened overnight to change his mind. Sir, I think that Colonel O'Neill is simply looking for any reason he can find to avoid having to make that decision. He's obviously already convinced himself that Daniel is still alive, and I believe he has conjured up this altered consciousness story in an attempt to convince us of the same thing. It's almost as if he thinks that he can keep Daniel alive just by pretending that he is."

"And if Dr. Jackson is? Alive, that is? And is, as the colonel says, just separated from his body?"

"Sir, I just don't believe that's possible …"

"Doctor, tell me. With what you know of Colonel O'Neill, what are the odds that he would be capable of even envisioning the story he's giving us, let alone recounting it in such great detail, and making it appear that he was arguing with Dr. Jackson the entire time?"

Janet sighed in resignation as the general voiced her own silent thoughts. "Not very likely, sir," she admitted. "But it is still possible. And him creating this story within his own mind is still a much more plausible explanation than Daniel actually … being there."

"I'm still not convinced either way, Doctor. In the past few months, I've seen far too many things to be able to just write this whole thing off as an hallucination. Let's not forget it's not been more than a week ago that we were attending Dr. Jackson's funeral. I don't know that any of us is prepared to do that again. And if there's even a chance that he might not be dead … I'm just going to need more proof before I can make a decision like this."

Janet nodded slowly. "General, I'd like to contact Dr. MacKenzie and have him do an evaluation of Colonel O'Neill's mental state. If this continues much longer, we are going to have to consider taking this responsibility away from him. I think we should make absolutely certain that we're justified in doing so."

Hammond considered her words for a moment. "Agreed. But if there's even a remote possibility that the colonel isn't making this up, Doctor, I want it to be made perfectly clear to Dr. MacKenzie that Jack's decision is to be honored, whatever it may be. If there's even a chance …" Hammond shook his head. "I'm not about to be responsible for ending the life of one of my own people, Doctor."

"Understood, General." Janet stood and nodded once. "Thank you, sir." She turned sharply and walked out the door.

George Hammond watched her leave, and then leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. He wondered if there was anyone on the planet that he could ask for advice on dealing with situations like this.

Somehow, he doubted it.


	8. Chapter 8

- - -

Chapter Eight

- - -

Jack sighed and flopped back on his bed again. "This is stupid."

"Jack …"

"Colonel, it's just …"

"What, Carter?" Jack asked, lifting his head to look at her. "It's what?"

"It's just really hard to believe. That's all."

Jack snorted. "See, Daniel? I told you no one would believe me. Or you. Us. Whatever."

"What else can I do, Jack?" Daniel asked from across the room. He was leaning against the doorframe, watching the corridor for Fraiser and Hammond to return. "It's not exactly like I have a lot of options here, is it?"

"Oh, I don't know. You could always try talking to someone else."

"Colonel, can't you please just talk to me? I'm right here."

Jack looked across at Daniel and sighed again. "Maybe you could convince Carter to admit that she knows you're here just as much as I do."

Sam clenched her teeth and turned away. "Sir, please …"

Daniel shrugged and leaned his head back against the wall. "I don't think she's ever going to admit that, Jack. She's too upset over all this." Daniel chuckled lightly. "She still thinks she killed me."

Jack laughed. "Oh, that's right. Yeah, that's funny, isn't it?"

"Sir?" Sam turned back to him, her face a mask of concern. "Sir, are you all right?"

"Oh, I'm fine. Daniel here was just telling me that you think you killed him, and he thinks that's why you won't admit that you can feel him. That's just kind of funny, seeing as how he's not even really dead."

"She's worried that they'll think she's …"

"Sir, they'd think I'm …"

"… as crazy as I am. Got it. From both of you." Jack smiled. "It's not really so bad, Carter. So they think I'm nuts. I don't really care any more. Daniel's alive. That's all that matters right now."

Sam stood up from the chair she'd been sitting in and walked to Daniel's body. "I do wish I could believe it, sir. I really do. I just can't. Colonel, we watched him die."

"Yeah, well, we watched him die the last time too," Jack answered with a shrug. "And we were wrong then, weren't we?"

Sam reached down to Daniel's head and brushed his hair out of his eyes absently. "But this time, we've got his body right here in front of us." She closed her eyes and let her hand drift to his arm. "I can't argue with this, sir."

"You mean you won't," Jack said.

"Jack!" Daniel called from the door. "They're coming back."

Jack pushed himself up and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. He shrugged his shoulders and straightened the scrubs Fraiser had insisted that he change into. "Do you think they believed us?"

Sam spun toward him in confusion. "Colonel?"

Jack waved his hand at her. "It's all right, Carter. Daniel?"

"No," Daniel answered quietly. He walked across the room quickly, crossing from the door to Jack's side as he shook his head. "No, I don't think they did."

"What makes you think that?" Jack asked.

"They're not alone," Daniel answered.

"Not alone?" Jack turned to face Daniel, his face a combination of concern and confusion. "Who's with them?"

Hammond and Fraiser entered the room, followed closely by a third person that SG-1 recognized immediately.

"MacKenzie," all three of them said in unison.

Jack closed his eyes briefly, and opened them again to look directly at Daniel's anxious face. Jack smiled at him, trying his best to reassure him that this new development was only a stumbling block. Daniel's life depended on whether or not Jack could convince the psychiatrist that he wasn't as crazy as he seemed to be. Jack had made Daniel a promise that no one would kill him, and he intended to keep it.

"Don't worry, Daniel," he whispered. "This might even be fun."

"Colonel O'Neill," General Hammond said. "Dr. MacKenzie is here …"

"Because you all think I'm crazy," Jack finished. "Yeah, I figured that out already."

"Jack, please," Daniel said beside him.

"So the good doctor is going to pick my brain, right? Find out why I've suddenly decided to go off the deep end?"

"Colonel, …" MacKenzie began.

"Don't bother with the pleasantries, okay? Daniel doesn't have time for them."

"Very well, Colonel," MacKenzie answered. "If you would please come with me to …"

"Um, no," Jack interrupted. "No, if you want to talk to me, you do it here. I'm not going anywhere."

Hammond stiffened. "Colonel, this is just an interview, but you had best cooperate."

"I will cooperate," Jack insisted. "But I'll do it here and nowhere else."

"Why here?" Sam asked.

"Because Daniel's body is here," Jack answered. "I promised him that I'd make sure no one killed him and no offense to anyone, but I don't know that I'm so sure that if I leave this room that he'll still be alive when I get back."

"I can stay here, Jack," Daniel pointed out.

"And what exactly are you going to do if someone decides to push that button, Daniel? How do you plan to stop them when no one but me can even see you?"

Hammond, Fraiser, and Carter sighed and MacKenzie smirked.

"Have it your way, Colonel. We can do this in here. If the rest of you will excuse us?"

Hammond nodded. "Captain?" He turned on his heel and left the room.

Sam gave one last look over her shoulder and flashed a weak smile at Jack before she followed Hammond out.

"I'll just be in my office. If you need me …" Janet let the thought trail off as she looked directly into Jack's eyes.

He appreciated the sentiment, and he nodded at her and smiled as she turned away.

"So, Colonel, now that it's just you and I, perhaps we should get started?"

"Should I leave?" Daniel asked.

Jack shook his head slightly, wanting to make certain that Daniel got the message without giving MacKenzie any indication that Daniel was still there.

"Okay, well, I'll just stand over here then," Daniel said. He walked around behind Jack and took up a position just on the other side of the bed.

MacKenzie pulled a chair up between Jack's bed and Daniel's and sat down with his back to Daniel's body. He looked up and flashed a quick smile that immediately made Jack want to smack him.

"Don't do that, Jack," Daniel said behind him. "Hitting the psychiatrist is a bad idea."

Jack turned his head quickly and looked up at Daniel in surprise. Daniel only shrugged.

"So, Colonel," MacKenzie began. "I understand that you're having some difficulty dealing with Dr. Jackson's condition."

"Not at all," Jack answered with a shake of his head. "I'm dealing with Daniel's condition just fine. It's everyone else that's having the problem with it."

"I see." Dr. MacKenzie scratched some notes down on his clipboard. "And what is Dr. Jackson's condition, Colonel? In your own words?"

"He's in trouble, and he needs our help."

MacKenzie kept writing. "Help with what, Colonel?"

Jack felt a sudden urge to grab the clipboard from the psychiatrist's hands and hit him with it, but one look at Daniel's face stopped him. It was Daniel's life on the line, and it depended solely on Jack's behavior. Jack didn't doubt that one wrong word, one suspect action, would motivate MacKenzie to relieve Jack of medical custody of Daniel's body, and if that happened, Jack knew that Daniel would not survive.

Nobody believed what Jack was saying—MacKenzie's sudden appearance was proof of that. Responding to his impulses and acting crazy wasn't going to make convincing them of the truth any easier. So long as Daniel's life depended solely on Jack, he would behave himself, no matter how much he wanted not to.

Jack took a deep breath and repeated the same explanation he'd given Fraiser, Hammond, and Carter.

"Something happened to him on the planet. He got separated from his body somehow, and he can't get back in. He thinks that the answer is on the planet, in some scribbles on the walls of the temple, but he has to go there to read them. So we need to take his body …"

"His dead body, Colonel?" MacKenzie asked without looking up.

Jack nodded slowly. "Yes, his body is dead. But it's only temporary, and when we go back …"

"Do you know what it means to be brain dead, Colonel?"

Jack froze as a sudden surge of anger flooded over him. The bastard knew damned well that Jack understood what brain death was, and he knew exactly how Jack came by the information. It wasn't exactly a secret, and it was right there in Jack's file. Jack gnashed his teeth and dug his fingers into the mattress he was sitting on.

"Easy, Jack." Daniel's soft voice floated across Jack's shoulder from behind. "He's trying to push you over the edge. He's trying to make you snap. Don't let him."

Jack nodded wordlessly, afraid that if he opened his mouth the string of invectives running through his mind just might tumble out.

At the lack of verbal response, MacKenzie looked up. "Colonel? Do you know what the term brain …"

"Yes," Jack managed through clenched teeth. "I know exactly what it means."

"Then you also understand that when a person is …"

"Yes." Jack's voice was tight and hard. The effort required to keep himself from actually growling was tremendous.

"And Dr. Fraiser did show you Dr. Jackson's electroencephalogram readings, did she not?"

"She did."

"You're doing fine, Jack," Daniel said. "Just stay calm. You can do this."

"So you do know how severe Dr. Jackson's condition is. You are aware that he's brain dead."

Jack closed his eyes and pressed his lips together tightly.

"Breathe, Jack. In and out. Let it go. I'm not dead. I'm standing right behind you."

Jack did as Daniel suggested and took a deep breath. He blew it out slowly, letting his anger dissipate into the air around him as he did so.

"I am aware of what the squiggly things …"

"EEG readings," Daniel corrected.

"… EEG readings make it look like, yes."

MacKenzie's pen scratched against the paper once more. The sound seemed inordinately loud to Jack's ears and it set his teeth on edge. His pounding head magnified the slight noise so badly that he could almost feel the pencil scratching against the surface of his brain. "So you maintain your belief that Dr. Jackson isn't actually dead?"

"It's not a belief," Jack answered.

He was certain. The only things he did know for a fact at that moment were that Daniel was alive, and that he was the only one who could keep him that way. Jack drew strength from those two things and continued on, feeling once again like he was in control of the situation.

"I know he's not."

"Good answer, Jack!"

Jack smiled.

"Colonel, I'd like to talk to you now about the events of just over one week ago. You returned to the SGC without Dr. Jackson, did you not?"

"We did," Jack answered with a nod.

"And why was that?"

"We thought he was dead."

MacKenzie's pencil was making more scratching noises, but Jack forced himself to ignore them. "And how was it that you came to believe that Dr. Jackson was dead?"

Jack sighed in frustration. "You know how that came to be. You were there when we figured it out, remember?"

Dr. MacKenzie lowered his pencil and looked up at Jack over the top of his glasses. "Colonel O'Neill, your tone is becoming hostile."

"I'm not being hostile," Jack snapped back. "You're asking stupid questions."

"Calm down, Jack," Daniel said. "It doesn't mean anything. It's just a question."

"Are you going to answer the question, Colonel?"

Jack turned his head and looked back at Daniel across his shoulder. Daniel reacted immediately and walked around the bed. He took up a position directly across from Jack, behind MacKenzie.

"I'm right here, Jack. Just look at me and answer him."

"Our memories were altered," Jack answered, never taking his eyes from Daniel's face. "Nem … an alien being wrote a false memory for us. He made us think that we'd watched Daniel …" Jack swallowed hard and closed his eyes.

"I'm not dead, Jack. You said it yourself. What you saw didn't really happen. It wasn't real then, and it's not real now."

"He made us think that we'd watched Daniel burn to death right in front of us." Jack flinched as the visions played against the inside of his closed eyelids again: Daniel being swallowed by the flames; Daniel's voice, screaming his name, begging for help that Jack was powerless to give, as the flames began biting into his flesh; Daniel crying out in terror and agony—"Jack! Help me!"

"Jack! Help me!"

Jack's eyes shot open as the sound of Daniel's cries reached his ears. The sight he saw froze his blood in his veins.

Daniel was standing behind MacKenzie, eyes closed, breathing heavily. Tears were running down his cheeks and his face was a mask of incredible pain.

He was still screaming.

"It hurts, Jack! God, help me! Jack!"

"Daniel!" Jack jumped to his feet and pushed his way past MacKenzie, all attempts to convince the psychiatrist of his sanity forgotten.

Daniel collapsed to the floor, writhing in pain. "Jack!"

Jack ignored MacKenzie's shocked stare and fell to his knees at Daniel's side. "Daniel! Open your eyes! Look at me!"

"Colonel O'Neill!" MacKenzie shouted from behind him. "What are you doing?"

Jack shook his head quickly. "I don't know. I don't know what's happening. Daniel, what's wrong? What hurts?"

"Jack! Help me! Help!"

_Daniel's voice, screaming his name, begging for help that Jack was powerless to give, as the flames began biting into his flesh … _

_The secrets of the universe floated above his head, filling the air with the undeniable truth that they existed … _

_A huge black shadow loomed behind Daniel's back, and before Jack could shout out a warning, it had wrapped itself around Daniel's chest and arms and was pulling him into itself … _

_Where did Earth and Oannes diverge?_

Where did Daniel end and Jack begin?

"Oh, Jesus!" Jack shouted as he finally understood. "No, Daniel, it's not real. It's not real. It was a dream. It was just a dream."

Daniel still writhed on the floor in front of him, and still he screamed.

"Daniel!"

"Colonel O'Neill!"

"Shut up, MacKenzie!" Jack bellowed without turning around. He heard the huff of indignation behind him, and he heard the psychiatrist moving away and picking up the phone to call Dr. Fraiser, but he paid him no mind. He was focused solely on Daniel and on convincing him that the pain he was feeling wasn't real, had never been real, had never been anything but a vision in Jack's mind.

"Daniel, listen to me. It's in my head. It's all in my head. It's not real. Wake up!"

The screaming stopped.

Daniel still lay on the floor, but he'd stopped thrashing against the flames that didn't exist. He was shaking and panting, but he wasn't screaming any more.

"My God," Daniel gasped.

"Daniel?" Jack reached out to touch Daniel's face, but pulled his hand back, afraid that touching him might cause the vision to start all over again. "Daniel, you with me?"

"That's what …" Daniel swallowed hard and drew another harsh, quivering breath. "That's what he made you think? That's how you thought I died?"

Jack nodded slowly. "Yeah."

"No wonder you … no wonder you didn't tell me."

"You okay?"

Daniel nodded and opened his eyes. He looked around slowly, almost as if he were looking for the flames to flash up again. When they didn't, he pushed himself up from the floor and leaned back against the side of his bed.

"What the hell was that, Jack? Why did I see that? Feel that?"

Jack moved over to sit beside Daniel and leaned back against the bed next to him. "Remember what you said about our minds being linked somehow? That the beam did something to our minds, and that's why I can see you?"

Daniel nodded.

"I think it's a bit more than that, Daniel."

"Colonel?"

Jack looked up and found a worried Janet Fraiser kneeling beside him. "Hey, Doc."

"Colonel O'Neill needs to be restrained and sedated," MacKenzie snapped from where he stood behind Dr. Fraiser. "General Hammond needs to be informed of just how severe the situation is. This man is clearly suffering from hallucinations and can no longer be entrusted …"

Fraiser waved MacKenzie off and turned back to Jack. "Colonel, what's going on? Are you all right?"

Jack smiled. "Oh, I'm fine, Doc. I'm just fine. Daniel was having a rough time of it for a while, but we're both okay now."

Janet closed her eyes and shook her head sadly. "Colonel, Daniel is …"

"No," Jack interrupted. "He's not. But I know why the EEG says he is."

"You do?" Daniel asked, his voice full of hope.

"You do?" Janet echoed the question, but her voice held only shock.

"Yep," Jack answered with a nod. He looked at Daniel and continued. "It says he's brain dead because he's not in his own head any more," he explained.

Daniel's face lit up with understanding, and Jack smiled.

"I'm in yours!"

"He's in mine."


	9. Chapter 9

- - -

Chapter Nine

- - -

Janet removed the electrodes from Jack's head and stepped back. She'd had some reservations about running the EEG that the colonel had insisted on, and she felt the need to express her concerns to him.

"Colonel, I don't think …"

"Please, Doc," Jack said. He smiled at her and softened his voice. "Janet, please. If there are two people in my head, the squiggly things will tell you, right?"

"They might," Janet admitted. "But if there aren't two …"

"If there aren't two then I'm really as crazy as MacKenzie says I am. And if that's true, then it's probably better to find out now, right?"

Janet smiled. "All right, Colonel. I'll go see what this says."

"Thank you," Jack answered.

Janet turned to the psychiatrist. "Dr. MacKenzie, I'll need your help with reading the EEG results."

MacKenzie huffed. "Doctor, I am astounded that you would give in so easily to the demands of a man who is so clearly psychotic."

Janet glanced across her shoulder at Jack. He had gotten up from his bed and gone to sit on the floor against Daniel's. He was already deep in conversation with someone that no one but him could see. Janet took MacKenzie by the arm and led him across the room before she turned to him again.

"I am not giving in to anything. I am exploring every possible explanation for the situation."

"But to agree to an electroencephalogram just to prove that there aren't two people in his head?"

Janet's eyes narrowed. "Didn't General Hammond make it abundantly clear to you that the colonel's wishes were to be honored?"

MacKenzie nodded. "Provided there was any chance that he wasn't insane, yes. But, Doctor …"

"We have no proof of that."

"We have a grown man sitting on the floor chatting with a dead archeologist!" Janet sighed and MacKenzie continued. "Playing into his delusions and entertaining the notion that Dr. Jackson has somehow been magically implanted in his brain isn't going to make this situation any easier for the colonel to deal with, Doctor." MacKenzie softened his tone. "And meanwhile, we've got a young man, whose wishes were very clearly laid out in advance, being forced to continue to exist against his will."

Janet closed her eyes and massaged her forehead with one hand. "I know." She opened her eyes and looked up again. "But if we're wrong, Dr. MacKenzie, if we do the wrong thing here … If he's dead, then we're keeping his body alive against his wishes. But if he's alive and we disconnect those machines, then we'd be killing him. The general said he needs more information, and I'm beginning to agree with him."

MacKenzie nodded in understanding. "Do whatever you feel is necessary, Doctor, of course. But I intend to begin the procedures to relieve Colonel O'Neill of his medical custody of Dr. Jackson's body."

"So soon?"

"There is no doubt whatsoever in my mind that the colonel is losing control of his mental faculties, Dr. Fraiser. The longer we delay, the longer Dr. Jackson's wishes are being ignored."

"But what about the … ?"

"I will wait until after the EEG readings have been examined. But when those tests come back normal, and I have no doubt that they will, then I will act."

- - -

Teal'c entered the isolation room silently and assessed the scene in front of him. Jack was seated on the floor with his back against Daniel Jackson's bed. He was talking animatedly with the empty air on his right. Dr. Fraiser and Dr. MacKenzie stood off to the side, near the wall. They were talking quietly but just as spiritedly as Jack.

Teal'c glanced once between the physician, the psychiatrist, and the colonel.

"What has transpired here?" he demanded.

Dr. Fraiser and Dr. MacKenzie spun around in surprise. Jack simply looked over at him and smiled.

"Hey, Teal'c."

"O'Neill."

Teal'c walked toward Daniel's bed, glancing across his shoulder to glare at MacKenzie as he did so.

"For what reason are you seated on the floor?" Teal'c asked. "Are you in need of assistance?"

"No, Teal'c," Jack answered with a shake of his head. "I'm fine. We're just sitting here while Daniel catches his breath. That's all."

Teal'c looked back at the doctors again. They immediately looked away and resumed their conversation. Teal'c turned back to Jack and lowered his voice. "What is the reason for Dr. MacKenzie's presence?"

Jack glanced across at the psychiatrist and sighed. "They think I'm crazy, Teal'c. He's here to confirm their suspicions."

Teal'c tilted his head slightly. "You are certain that they believe this?"

Jack chuckled. "After the performance I just put on? Oh yeah." Seeing Teal'c's confusion, Jack continued. "Daniel had a bit of a run-in with one of Nem's little memory implants."

"I was not aware that Daniel Jackson had received any false memories."

"He didn't. I did." Jack looked again to his right. "Let's just say that his reaction to watching himself burst into flames was worse than ours were."

Teal'c shook his head slowly. "Daniel Jackson is dead, O'Neill. He cannot react to anything."

Jack tapped himself in the forehead. "He's in my brain, Teal'c. Everything I think, everything I remember, he sees it. And apparently, if it's about him, he feels it, too."

Teal'c opened his mouth to speak again, but was interrupted by Dr. Fraiser as she walked up behind him.

"Teal'c, I'm glad you're here." She turned her attention to Jack momentarily. "How are you doing, Colonel?"

Jack smiled. "We're both fine, Doc."

Janet nodded quickly and turned to Teal'c again. "Teal'c, Dr. MacKenzie and I need to go examine Colonel O'Neill's brain scan …"

Teal'c turned to Jack in alarm.

"Don't worry, Teal'c. I asked her to do it. I want to prove to them that I've got Daniel floating around in my brain, and it seems to me that this might be the only way to do that."

Teal'c nodded once and Janet continued.

"Would you mind staying with the colonel, Teal'c? He's been … rather, he says that Daniel has been having some difficulty. I'd really rather not leave him alone right now."

"I shall remain with O'Neill, Dr. Fraiser."

"Good. Thank you, Teal'c." Janet smiled down at Jack again. "Colonel, I'm going to leave you with Teal'c now …"

Jack laughed. "Ya know, Doc, I might be crazy, but I'm not stupid."

Janet closed her eyes and lowered her head in shame. "Of course you're not, Colonel. I'm sorry." She opened her eyes again and looked Jack directly in the eye. "I'll be back as soon as we've briefed the general, sir."

Jack nodded and smiled as Janet stood and walked away. As soon as she and MacKenzie had disappeared into the corridor, Jack sighed and leaned back against the bed with his eyes closed.

"Are you unwell, O'Neill?"

Jack shook his head. "No. I'm just a little tired is all. And Daniel's having a field day with this being in my brain thing. He's jabbering a million miles a minute and he … oh, you are too!"

Teal'c tilted his head again.

"Daniel, just hold it a minute, okay? You're scaring Teal'c."

Teal'c simply raised an eyebrow.

"Okay, okay. You're not scaring Teal'c. But you're annoying the hell outta me. And I can't even pawn you off on someone else for a while, so just do me a favor, okay? Can you stop with the theories for now? Give my brain a couple of minutes to catch up?"

Jack was obviously satisfied with the answer, because he smiled, closed his eyes, and leaned his head back.

"Thank you."

Teal'c stood in silence and observed Jack for a few moments. Once he decided that Jack's other conversation was over, he spoke again.

"O'Neill, I am most concerned about your current behavior."

Jack opened his eyes and lifted his head. "Hm?"

"You now believe that Daniel Jackson is living inside your body?"

Jack shook his head. "No, not my body. He's got his own body … sort of. He's sitting beside me, not on top of me. No, he's just in my head."

Jack lifted an arm. Teal'c grasped it firmly and pulled him to his feet. Jack turned back to the floor, but quickly shifted his gaze up and shrugged. "Oh, okay."

"How did Daniel Jackson come to reside in your head?"

Jack shook his head as he turned back to face Teal'c. "I have no idea. I think it's probably got something to do with that beam, but Daniel's got this crazy idea that it's that bullet that went through his shoulder."

"In what way?" Teal'c asked.

"Um … something to do with our blood getting mixed together and part of his consciousness getting stuck to the bullet or something. I don't understand a word he said, to be honest. Carter would understand it, though."

"If this is true, then how do we go about …?"

"Damn it, Daniel, what?" Jack suddenly demanded.

Teal'c leaned forward slightly and watched the scene with intense interest, his question forgotten.

"How would I know that? I'm here, and you're there. I don't know why, but … Oh, no you don't! Daniel, don't you dare! Daniel!"

Jack threw his arms up in front of himself as if to ward off a blow from an invisible enemy. He started to shout, but his voice was stolen by a gasp before he could. His whole body stiffened and his eyes closed.

"O'Neill!" Teal'c shouted in alarm as he jumped forward. "O'Neill, what is the matter?"

Jack's body relaxed and he drew a deep breath. His arms fell to his sides limply.

"O'Neill?"

Jack opened his eyes slowly, and a smile spread across his face. "I did it," he said in a voice filled with awe. "Wow. This is … this is weird."

Teal'c stared back at the face in front of him. He found himself unable to believe what he was seeing.

"Hey, Teal'c," Jack said. "What's wrong?"

"O'Neill," Teal'c said slowly as he stepped back from the man in front of him. "What has happened to your eyes?"

"My eyes?"

"They are blue."

- - -

Daniel blinked in momentary confusion. He wouldn't have thought that jumping into another person's body would have been quite so disorienting. "My eyes have always been blue."

"They have not. Your eyes have always been brown."

"What?" Daniel forgot where—or rather who—he was. "No, Teal'c, Jack's eyes are brown. Mine are blue."

Teal'c took one deliberate step forward, and Daniel found himself backing away. Teal'c leaned closer and glared at Daniel with barely masked fury. "Then I must demand that you tell me who you are."

"What?" Daniel shook his head and pressed his hands against Teal'c's chest to push him away. "Teal'c, it's me."

"You are not O'Neill."

"Of course I'm …" Daniel's words trailed off and full comprehension finally dawned on him. "I'm in Jack's body," he said. He turned away from Teal'c and started to search the room for something he could use as a mirror. "Of course! I'm in Jack's body, so of course I look like him." Daniel glanced back at Teal'c across his shoulder as he continued searching. "You say my eyes are blue, though? You see my eyes? Not Jack's?"

"Before I can tell you if I am seeing your eyes, I would first have to be aware of who you are."

"Teal'c, I told you. It's me. I'm me. I'm just sort of … Jack … for the moment."

Teal'c almost roared as he reached out and grabbed Daniel's forearms. Daniel suddenly found himself staring up into Teal'c's smoldering eyes as the larger man's fingers dug painfully into his biceps.

"Who are you?" Teal'c demanded.

Daniel looked back at him in shock. Teal'c continued to stare at him, and Daniel felt very much like a small insect under a microscope. He squirmed and tried to pull free of Teal'c's grasp, but the Jaffa was much too strong.

"Teal'c, that hurts. Please. Let go."

"Tell me who you are, or I shall remove your arms from your body and assault your head with them."

Daniel laughed in spite of the seriousness of Teal'c's tone. "But Teal'c, wouldn't that cause me great harm?"

Teal'c froze. His eyes studied Daniel's face even more closely. All at once, Teal'c's eyes widened and he leaned forward.

"Daniel Jackson?"

Daniel smiled, raised his right hand as far as he could, and wiggled his fingers. "Hello."


	10. Chapter 10

- - -

Chapter Ten

- - -

Teal'c's eyes moved back and forth between the man in his grip and the body in the bed beside him.

"How can this be possible?" he asked. "The mind and body of Daniel Jackson are both dead."

"No, Teal'c," Daniel answered softly. "My body is dead. I am still very much alive."

"So you do reside inside of O'Neill."

"Not entirely," Daniel said. "He can see me and hear me, yes. And we're definitely sharing each other's thoughts and memories. But we're still two separate … people. To be honest, Teal'c, I have absolutely no idea what's going on here. I don't know what I expected to happen, but it definitely wasn't this. Then again, this has never happened before, so there's no way I could know."

If the statement confused Teal'c, which Daniel admitted to himself that it must have, he gave no sign. "Is O'Neill present as well?"

Daniel closed his eyes and concentrated as he searched for Jack's presence in his mind. "He's here," he answered slowly. "But I think he's asleep. I don't think it's possible for both of us to be awake at the same time. Actually, I don't think I'm supposed to be in here at all." Daniel opened his eyes again and looked up into Teal'c's face. "Teal'c, do you think you could … ?"

Teal'c released his grip on Daniel's arms immediately. "I apologize, Daniel Jackson. I did not intend to cause you injury."

"It's okay," Daniel answered. "I would imagine that watching Jack's eyes turn blue would probably freak me out a bit too." Daniel smiled. "Which is why I'm going to find a mirror."

Teal'c followed Daniel as he moved around the room. Daniel wondered if perhaps Teal'c was beginning to think that he was dreaming too, like Jack had done at first. When Daniel glanced back at Teal'c, though, he saw no confusion or uncertainty on the Jaffa's face.

"Teal'c? Are you okay with this?"

Teal'c raised an eyebrow. "You are alive, Daniel Jackson. I see nothing that is not 'okay' with this situation."

Daniel smiled. "Good. So you don't mind helping us out a bit?"

"I will help in any way I can. What do you require of me?"

"Well, some help with the MacKenzie thing would be nice," Daniel said. "After what he saw Jack do, I think we're going to need all the help we can get to convince him that Jack's not insane."

"Of course," Teal'c replied.

Daniel finally remembered the two-way mirror that hung between the isolation room and the observation room above, and he walked toward it quickly; Teal'c followed close behind him.

Daniel simply stared at the reflection that looked back at him. He'd known what to expect, but actually seeing it was still a shock. He was looking into a mirror and seeing another person's face—Jack's face—but he was staring directly into his own eyes.

"Daniel Jackson?" Teal'c asked quietly.

"This is incredible," Daniel whispered. "This has to be the weirdest thing I've ever seen."

"It is a most unusual sight," Teal'c admitted. "Yet it is comforting."

"How's that?"

"You are not dead. O'Neill is not insane. Your eyes stand as proof of both of these facts."

Daniel smiled at himself in the mirror. "You've got a point there," he said. "Even MacKenzie is going to be hard pressed to argue with this."

"Indeed."

Daniel started to step away from the mirror, but faltered and stumbled when a sharp, stabbing spear of white-hot agony shot through his head. He leaned against the wall for support and pressed the palm of his right hand against his temple.

"Daniel Jackson?" Teal'c stepped forward and placed a hand against his arm. "You are in pain."

Daniel nodded his head slightly and grimaced. "Yeah," he gasped. "A bit, yeah."

"Can I be of assistance?"

"No, I just think …" Daniel sagged heavily against the wall. Teal'c grasped his arms to keep him from falling to the floor. "I think that maybe … I can't stay, Teal'c. This really, really hurts."

"You will be well again if you leave O'Neill's body?"

"Oh, I hope so," Daniel answered. He looked up at Teal'c once more as desperation gripped his heart. "MacKenzie … if I leave now, he won't see me."

"You cannot stay," Teal'c said. "You are causing yourself serious distress and you may be damaging O'Neill's body."

"I don't think I can do this again, Teal'c. This is my one chance … I should have waited …"

"I will tell Dr. MacKenzie what I have seen, Daniel Jackson." Teal'c allowed himself to bear more of Daniel's weight as he sank further down the wall. "Your strength is waning. You must leave O'Neill before you lack to ability to do so."

Daniel nodded in agreement. "Thank you," he whispered.

"You are welcome."

Daniel closed his eyes and drew in a deep, ragged breath. The body in Teal'c's arms shuddered once and then went completely limp.

"Daniel Jackson?"

"What the hell just happened?" Jack lifted his head and looked around in confusion. "And why are you hugging me?"

"O'Neill?"

"Of course it's me," Jack answered hotly. "Who else would it be?" Jack pushed himself out of Teal'c's arms and stood straight. "What's going on?"

Jack glanced around the room again. His brown eyes widened when he saw what was lying on the floor at his feet.

"Daniel?"

Jack knelt down at Daniel's side and glanced up at Teal'c. "What happened to him? What'd he do?" Jack closed his eyes and shook his head. "And how would you know? You can't even see him."

"Daniel Jackson was experiencing a great deal of pain, O'Neill. I believe he may have lost consciousness."

Jack looked up in surprise. "You know what happened to him? How do you … ?"

"I have seen Daniel Jackson, O'Neill," Teal'c answered simply.

"You have?" Jack asked excitedly. "That's great, Teal'c! When? How?" Jack's eyes narrowed in a mixture of confusion and suspicion. "And why don't I remember it?"

Teal'c's face betrayed nothing as he calmly answered, "You were sleeping."

Jack settled himself on the floor next to Daniel. "Sleeping?"

Teal'c nodded.

Jack looked up at him. "He did it, didn't he? He jumped into me."

"He did."

"Of all the stupid, reckless … Damn it, Daniel, I told you no! Why didn't you listen to me?"

Daniel neither moved nor responded.

Jack had noticed immediately that Daniel's eyes were open. He was still conscious, but he stared straight ahead. His eyes were blank and empty, while his face was a mask of terrible pain. Moans and whimpers escaped his lips, and Jack leaned forward in expectation. He hoped that Daniel would be able to pull himself out of whatever it was that had gripped him, but as the moments passed and Daniel showed no signs of recovering, Jack found himself growing more and more uncertain.

- - -

Sam sat in her lab, tapping her pencil on her desk and staring at the data on her computer screen without really seeing it. She had hoped to work on her research from P2A-759, but she wasn't able to concentrate for more than a few seconds at a time. She was trying to hide from the events of the past day, and she knew it, but studying the energy readings that were so closely linked to Daniel's death was a lousy way to do it.

She jumped back slightly as a thought suddenly occurred to her, and her mind repeated what she'd just said to herself: the energy readings were closely linked to Daniel's death …

She'd seen images in the past of "energy clouds" supposedly leaving a body at the exact moment of death—spirit photography it was called. She'd never been able to get close enough to one of the energy blobs on 759 to get an accurate reading of them, but they had affected her physically, and she'd felt the exact same thing here, in her lab, and again in the isolation room …

The more she thought about it, the more solid the theory forming in her brain became, and the more the events of the past twenty-four hours began to make sense.

Human souls were comprised in part by the consciousness, which was sometimes theorized to be a form of electricity, the "wiring" that defined individual people; it was believed that the energy cloud captured in spirit photography was the consciousness escaping. The surface of 759 was "inhabited" by formless energy clouds. She had seen a shadow going through the wall of the temple shortly before Daniel and the colonel got caught in the beam, and the colonel had kept rubbing his eyes and complaining about seeing shadows …

Electricity had different effects on everyone—that much she knew from her classes at the Academy. Some people felt it, much as she had felt the hair on her back stand up and the fluttering in her chest. Some people were just unsettled by it, much as Teal'c had said his symbiote had been. Some people could actually see it, just as the colonel had seen those shadows. Some people could hear it, and they described it as a high-pitched buzzing or ringing noise, exactly like the sound of the insect that Daniel had sworn kept bothering him …

If those energy clouds on 759 were actually human consciousnesses that had been separated from their bodies, and the different annoyances SG-1 had each felt had actually been their bodies reacting to the presence of disembodied souls, and they'd all had the same reactions here at the base, to something none of them could identify …

Sam's pencil hit the surface of her desk so hard that it snapped in half, but she didn't even notice. Her every thought was wrapped up in the implications of her theory. If she were right, and if Daniel's consciousness had somehow been removed from his body before he actually died, and if he'd somehow managed to follow them back to the base, maybe not even realizing what had happened to him …

Daniel's consciousness was still alive?

Memories flooded her mind, impressions of things she had seen and felt and had dismissed as impossible, as wishful thinking, as dreams. She remembered the buzzing sound she had heard the night before, that had seemed so comforting and familiar, and when she really concentrated on the sound, she could hear Daniel's voice beneath it, offering her absolution for her part in "killing" him and reassuring her that he wasn't really dead. And she had heard him in the isolation room that morning, despite her protests to the contrary. It had all been so confusing before, but it wasn't any more. It all made perfect sense, and it pointed to only one conclusion.

Daniel was still alive!

The realization brought her comfort, but it also brought with it the deep, undeniable feeling that something was horribly, terribly wrong. Something had happened in the isolation room … she had no idea how she knew that, but only knew that she had to get to him. Daniel may have been alive, but he was far from safe.

Sam pushed herself away from her desk and ran down the corridor as quickly as she could.

- - -

_"Daniel."_

_Aynad's voice sounded through the fog in his mind, focusing it on the task at hand. He wasn't shouting, but he sounded frantic._

_"Daniel, my friend, you must answer me."_

_"Aynad?"_

_"Daniel, thank the gods. The demon god has found us!"_

_"What? How?"_

_"I do not know how he was able to follow us, but he is here. I have felt him. He is very near to _

_us."_

_"Does Daniel know? Aynad, does he understand what's happening?"_

_"I have told him all that I can, about our history and how Belos came to be here, but he does not yet understand. He still wishes to believe that he is only dreaming," Aynad answered. "He has been occupied with trying to reach the others."_

_"Aynad, you need to get him out of there. Now!"_

_"I cannot, my friend. He is currently… indisposed."_

_"Indisposed? What do you mean 'indisposed'?"_

_"I do not know what has happened to him. Several moments ago, he grasped his head and cried out in great pain, and now he lies on the floor and will not respond to me."_

_Daniel sighed. "I felt it too, Aynad. But this isn't the way it's supposed to be. He and I shouldn't be feeling each other's pain. We're not the same person!"_

_Aynad continued speaking as though Daniel hadn't said a word, or as though he hadn't heard him. "He grows weaker with each passing moment that he is so far distanced from his body. He must return to it soon, or he will die. My friend, I fear that we…"_

_The sudden silence struck fear in Daniel's heart, and he called out._

_"Aynad! Aynad, what's wrong?"_

_"The demon god! My friend, I must terminate our communication. The demon god grows ever nearer. I will do what I can to protect him, but I fear that I… Belos!"_

_"Aynad!"_

_"You will not have him, Belos! As I fought you once before, I will fight you now! Even if it means my own death, you will not have this young one again!"_

_"Aynad!" Daniel's cries went unanswered, and the few moments of silence that followed were punctuated by a feeling, a knowledge and a certainty that caused him pain very near to what he had felt the day he had watched SG-1 fall by Belos' hand._

_Aynad had given his life to protect the twelfth Daniel Jackson._

_Daniel wept silently for his fallen friend, but even as he mourned, he understood the sudden importance of his own task. With Aynad gone, there would be no more time loops, there would be no more chances._

_If the eleventh Daniel Jackson failed now, everything he knew, everything he loved, everything he fought for, was forfeit._

_Daniel wiped the hot, bitter tears away and steeled himself for the struggle ahead. Time was running out. Belos had succeeded in gaining unfettered access to Daniel's consciousness – he would not succeed in stealing his soul._

- - -

"O'Neill?" Teal'c said quietly. "The condition of Daniel Jackson remains unchanged?"

Jack nodded slowly.

"Perhaps we should consider …"

Sam burst through the door of the isolation room. The flush of her cheeks and her breathlessness were clues that she had run the entire way from her lab. She tried to mask her obvious excitement and make it appear as though she bolted through doors as a matter of course, but she failed miserably.

"Carter? What are you doing here?"

Sam flushed again, this time in embarrassment. "I um … I just had to … Is the doc … ?" Sam looked back and forth between the two men in front of her and dropped all pretense of calmness. "What's going on? What's wrong?"

Jack turned to Teal'c in surprise, and Teal'c raised his eyebrow. "What do you mean what's wrong?"

"I was down in my lab, and I suddenly had this overwhelming urge to be here. Are you all right, sir? Teal'c?"

"We're fine, Carter," Jack answered softly. "It's Daniel."

Sam tried to hold on to the certainty she had felt in her lab, but when her eyes settled on the body in the bed, she closed her eyes and turned away. "Colonel, Daniel is …"

"Daniel Jackson is alive," Teal'c declared. "I have seen him."

Sam's face brightened slightly. "You have? How did you do that?"

"Daniel jumped into my body," Jack said. "Teal'c talked to him for a few minutes."

Sam's excitement grew. "Well, can he do it again? Can I see him? Colonel, can I talk to Daniel too?"

Jack only shook his head.

"Daniel Jackson's possession of O'Neill's body has taken a great toll on him. He has been unresponsive for several moments."

Sam moved closer to the two men and looked back and forth between them. "Well, what's wrong with him? Is he all right?"

"Wait a minute," Jack said. "A few seconds ago, you were all ready to give me that, 'Colonel, Daniel is dead,' speech again. Now you believe us?"

Sam nodded.

"So what changed?" Jack asked. "Why are you so willing to believe it now?"

Sam smiled sheepishly. "Sir, I'm almost ashamed to admit this, but I think I've known that Daniel was still alive almost from the very beginning."

"You have?" Jack asked in disbelief.

"Why did you not speak of it sooner?" Teal'c asked.

"I was scared," Sam admitted. "I mean, I knew he was alive, but we were standing here staring at his body … I just didn't know what to believe." Sam dropped her eyes to avoid Jack's icy glare. "You were right, sir. I did hear him this morning. I was just too scared to admit it."

"Damn it, Carter, do you know what might have happened if you'd backed me up from the beginning? We could have gone back to the planet already! We could have him back by now!"

"I know, sir," Sam answered softly. "I'm sorry."

Jack shook his head in anger and started to speak again, but a loud groan from the floor stopped him.

"Daniel?" Jack rose to his knees at Daniel's side and leaned forward. "Daniel, you back with us?"

Daniel blinked slowly and pushed himself up until he was sitting upright. "Yeah, I think so."

"What the hell did you think you were doing?" Jack demanded. "I told you not to do that. Look at what you did to yourself!"

Daniel nodded slowly. "Yeah, I know. But it seemed like a good idea at the time …"

"All right," Jack said. He glanced up at Teal'c and Sam before he turned back to Daniel. "There's nothing we can do about it now. What's done is done. We need to concentrate on the positives here. Teal'c's seen you now, and Sam's ready to admit that she can hear you …"

Daniel pushed himself to his feet suddenly and spun to face his body in the bed.

"Daniel? Are you listening to me?"

When Daniel turned back to face Jack, his expression was one of pure panic. "Jack, we've got to go back now. I've got to go back now."

Jack looked back at Teal'c and Sam again, and was somehow not surprised that they had moved closer to Daniel. The expressions on their faces made it clear that they felt Daniel's sudden desperation.

"Daniel, relax. It's going to be all right now."

"No, Jack, it's not all right."

"So MacKenzie won't see you. So what? Teal'c did. And Carter's going to back him up."

"No, Jack, you don't understand."

"We've got time now, Daniel. We'll keep your body on the machines as long as we need to. We'll convince them of the truth."

"Jack …"

"I know that this isn't the best situation to be in, but it's the one we've got. The machines'll do their thing, and we'll do ours, okay? You can calm down. We've got all the time in the world to do this."

"No," Daniel answered with a shake of his head. "There is no more time."

"What are you talking about? The machines …"

"The machines don't matter!" Daniel cried out. "I'm dying!"


	11. Chapter 11

- - -

Chapter Eleven

- - -

Jack stared back at Daniel in horror. He heard Sam gasp behind him.

"He's dying," she said softly. "That's what he's saying, isn't it? He's dying."

"What has happened, Daniel Jackson?"

Daniel shook his head. "I don't know. But something's wrong—something's happened on the planet … I think … no, I know. Belos found him, Aynad's dead … Oh, God, there's no one to stop Belos now! There's no one to help him, to teach him, to protect him … I never should have come here. I should have stayed there with him where I belonged. He's going to die, and it's all my fault!" Jack didn't understand what Daniel was talking about, but the look of terror in his eyes needed no explanation. "If we don't go back soon …"

"How long have you got?" Jack asked.

"There's no way to know. It all depends on Belos … maybe six hours? I definitely won't make it through the night like this. I'm already getting weaker."

Jack looked at Daniel closely, and he could see the truth in what Daniel was saying. Daniel was pale—his eyes were circled with darkness and his cheeks were flushed. He was leaning against the bed rail for support, and his shoulders were noticeably lower than they had been only an hour before.

"We're out of time," Jack declared. He turned to face Teal'c and Sam and resumed command of his team. "You two get yourselves to that briefing. You're all we've got now."

"But, Colonel, what if they won't listen to us either?"

"Make them listen to you, Captain," Jack ordered. "Make them believe you. Daniel's life depends on it." Jack glanced across his shoulder at Daniel once more and lowered his voice. "We are not losing him like this. Do you understand me?"

Sam nodded quickly.

"Go," Jack said. "Save him."

Sam and Teal'c nodded in unison and turned toward the door. Jack watched them leave and then turned to face Daniel once again.

Jack could see the pain on Daniel's face and the fear in his eyes. He closed his eyes briefly and sent up a silent prayer that Sam and Teal'c would be able to convince Hammond to let them go back to the planet. There was no way that they were just going to stand by and let Daniel die—not after everything he'd gone through to keep him alive.

"Just hang on a little longer, Daniel," Jack whispered. "Please, just hang on."

- - -

Sam and Teal'c entered the briefing room just in time to hear MacKenzie finishing his presentation. General Hammond glanced up at them and motioned for them both to be seated.

"The results of the scan are exactly what I expected them to be," MacKenzie was saying. "There is only one set of brain waves. There is only one person in the colonel's brain, and that person is Colonel O'Neill himself."

"Your scans are incorrect," Teal'c announced.

Hammond, MacKenzie, and Janet looked up in surprise.

"Teal'c?" Janet said. "Why do you say that?"

"I have seen Daniel Jackson," Teal'c explained. "Only moments ago, in the isolation room, I was speaking to him."

Hammond and Janet looked at each other in disbelief and MacKenzie snorted. "Of course you were, Mr. Teal'c."

"Dr. MacKenzie, do not be so willing to dismiss what I say. Daniel Jackson used O'Neill's body in order to communicate with me."

"Wait," MacKenzie said. "The colonel became Dr. Jackson?"

"No," Teal'c answered. "Daniel Jackson assumed control of O'Neill's body in order to speak to me."

MacKenzie smiled. "Now I understand exactly what's going on here. General, based on Mr. Teal'c's claims, I believe that we should move forward on the assumption that Colonel O'Neill is suffering from DID."

"DID?" Sam asked incredulously. "You think the colonel has suddenly developed DID?"

"Obviously he's always been at risk for it, Captain," MacKenzie said. "That his first break has come so soon after having lost Dr. Jackson cannot be a coincidence."

"What is this DID?" Teal'c asked.

"It's a mental illness, Teal'c," Sam explained. "DID stands for Dissociative Identity Disorder."

"It's a multiple personality disorder," MacKenzie added. "It occurs when the person in question is presented with an event or experience that they cannot allow themselves to accept."

"I do not understand how this relates to Daniel Jackson inhabiting O'Neill's body."

"It wasn't really Dr. Jackson, Mr. Teal'c," MacKenzie said. "It was an intricate recreation of Dr. Jackson that has been fashioned and executed entirely in Colonel O'Neill's mind."

"I disagree," Teal'c said. "I was present for the entire conversation. I am certain that I was speaking to Daniel Jackson."

"The personalities seem very real. That is their purpose. The primary personality protects itself by creating detailed lives for the alternates. And though the alternates are almost always aware of the primary personality, the reverse is rarely true."

"Daniel Jackson was aware that he inhabited O'Neill's body. He remarked more than once that it was an odd sensation."

"But Colonel O'Neill didn't have the same reaction, did he?" MacKenzie asked. "Colonel O'Neill has no memory of what happened while the Daniel personality was in control, does he?"

Teal'c's lack of response was the answer that MacKenzie had expected.

Hammond cleared his throat and leaned forward. "Dr. Fraiser, what is your opinion?"

"Dr. Fraiser is an excellent physician," MacKenzie said. "However, General, she is not a psychiatrist."

"She is the Chief Medical Officer on this base," Hammond replied hotly. "She is also Colonel O'Neill's primary care physician, and I asked for her opinion."

MacKenzie smiled smugly and shrugged.

Janet ignored the psychiatrist and gave her answer directly to General Hammond.

"Well, sir, Dr. MacKenzie's theory is certainly possible. However, the colonel is significantly older than the average age for the onset of DID."

"Averages do not reflect the high end of the spectrum, Doctor. This is why they are called averages," MacKenzie said.

Janet cleared her throat and continued. "Additionally, there is a growing belief that DID is not an actual illness, but rather a condition that grows out of therapy …"

"The colonel has not been receiving therapy, Doctor," MacKenzie pointed out. "That rules out the possibility that this is a therapy-induced condition."

Janet gave him an annoyed look before she continued. "There is also the issue of exactly who the alleged alternate personality is. We're not talking about an alternate version of the colonel himself. We're talking about the possibility that Colonel O'Neill has adopted Dr. Jackson's personality."

"The nature of individual personalities is always relative to the situation," MacKenzie explained. "As the colonel is compensating for Dr. Jackson's death, it makes logical sense that his alternate personality would be closely related to Dr. Jackson."

Janet rolled her eyes. "And while I agree that Dr. Jackson's death has upset the colonel greatly, I don't believe that this is nearly traumatic enough to result in …"

"He is hypersensitive to Dr. Jackson's death," MacKenzie interrupted. "His mind was subjected to an alien device that rewrote his memory only nine days ago. He may not have been fully recovered, and yesterday he was exposed to yet another mind-altering technology, one that he claims allowed him to communicate telepathically. He believes that Dr. Jackson's death was the direct result of an order that he gave. If that weren't enough, he now finds himself faced with the decision to terminate Dr. Jackson's life support. I would call that situation significantly traumatic."

Hammond slowly turned his head to face MacKenzie. "Are you finished, Doctor?"

MacKenzie nodded. "Yes, sir."

"Good. I asked for Dr. Fraiser's opinion—not an open debate."

"General, I truly believe that …"

"Enough, Doctor."

"Of course, sir." MacKenzie's smugness returned as he picked his pencil up from the table.

Janet gave the general a quick appreciative smile.

"The strongest evidence against Dr. MacKenzie's theory, sir, seems to be Teal'c."

Janet looked across the table. Teal'c tilted his head slightly and waited for the questions that he knew were coming.

"Teal'c, are you absolutely positive that you were talking to Daniel? It wasn't the colonel impersonating him?"

"It was not O'Neill," Teal'c said. "I was speaking with Daniel Jackson."

"Tell us what happened, Teal'c," Janet said. "What convinced you that this was Daniel?"

Sam smiled knowingly at Teal'c and nodded in support. Teal'c nodded back. "Shortly after you left the isolation room to examine the results of the electroencephalogram, O'Neill began shouting and raised his arms to defend himself from something I could not see."

"That is when you believe that Dr. Jackson entered his body?" Hammond asked.

"It is. The mannerisms and speech patterns ceased to be those of O'Neill. I demanded the identity of this new being. Initially, he did not answer me and he seemed distracted. When I became physically threatening to him, he spoke words that convinced me that he was, in fact, Daniel Jackson."

"What did he say?" Janet asked.

"He asked me if removing his arms and assaulting him with them would not cause him great harm."

Sam could not stop the small giggle that escaped her lips. Janet and Hammond smiled at each other in mild amusement. MacKenzie looked perplexed.

"He never said to you, 'I'm Daniel Jackson'?"

"He did not."

"I'm confused. How did that question prove that you were talking to Daniel?" MacKenzie asked.

"I had asked that exact question during a conversation that had taken place less than thirty-six hours earlier."

"A conversation you had with Daniel?" MacKenzie asked.

"That is correct," Teal'c answered.

"I see."

Janet's and Hammond's smiles grew wider. Sam grinned broadly at Teal'c, nodded again, and turned toward MacKenzie in anticipation.

"It had to be Daniel," she said. "The colonel wouldn't have known to say that."

"Perhaps not," MacKenzie replied. He turned back to Teal'c. "Tell me, Mr. Teal'c, was anyone else present for this earlier conversation you had with Daniel?"

"Indeed," Teal'c answered. "O'Neill was with us."

The smug smile returned to MacKenzie's face. "I see. So this question was not something that would be exclusive to Daniel. The colonel knew about it as well?"

Janet's smile fell away from her face. Hammond looked crestfallen. Teal'c became suddenly uneasy with the situation and turned to Sam, who looked back at him with wide eyes. Her expression was one of sudden desperation.

Teal'c had only one chance left to convince MacKenzie of the truth. Captain Carter had told him that it might be best to keep his observations about O'Neill's eyes to himself, lest he give MacKenzie the impression that he too had begun seeing things that did not exist. With Dr. MacKenzie's obvious dismissal of his statements, Teal'c had no choice but to use this information.

Teal'c turned back to MacKenzie.

"The question alone would have been unconvincing. However, I was also presented with physical evidence of Daniel Jackson's presence."

Three heads swiveled toward Teal'c in unison—two in excitement and one in shock.

"What physical evidence?" Janet asked.

"The being that I spoke to possessed the eyes of Daniel Jackson."

Janet, Hammond and MacKenzie were stunned. Sam's expression was one of support. Teal'c's face showed only certainty. Silence reigned for several moments, until finally Janet recovered enough to speak.

"Do you mean to say that Colonel O'Neill's eyes actually turned blue?"

"It was the color that first garnered my attention. However, on closer inspection I discovered that O'Neill's eyes had not simply changed color. They had in fact been replaced."

"By Daniel's?" Janet asked.

Teal'c nodded.

Hammond turned to MacKenzie as his hope returned. The psychiatrist still seemed to be stunned by Teal'c's revelation, as if he had no explanation for it. Encouraged by MacKenzie's lack of response, Hammond pressed forward.

"Doctor, I'm no psychiatrist, but I'm going to assume that this is not a normal thing with DID?"

MacKenzie's eyes moved back and forth between Teal'c and the general slowly, as if he were searching for an answer. His gaze settled on Teal'c, and the smile slowly returned to MacKenzie's face.

"On the contrary, General. It is more common than you know."

Sam was stunned. "People's eyes changing color, being completely replaced by someone else's, is normal?"

MacKenzie shook his head. "No one's eyes changed color, Captain. O'Neill's performance was simply good enough to convince Mr. Teal'c that he was Dr. Jackson. And then Mr. Teal'c's mind replaced pieces of what he was actually seeing with things he believed that he should see."

Sam turned to Teal'c in desperation. Janet and Hammond watched as Teal'c's certainty turned to anger.

"My mind did no such thing," Teal'c insisted. "The eyes I saw were real."

"If you truly believe that, Mr. Teal'c, then perhaps you too are suffering a breakdown. You have a personal relationship of your own with Daniel. Maybe you are just as unwilling as Colonel O'Neill to admit that he's gone."

"I suffer from no mental illness," Teal'c declared. "Daniel Jackson yet lives. I have seen him."

"That sounds familiar. I believe that O'Neill began his descent into madness by making those exact claims." MacKenzie shook his head. "You saw nothing, Mr. Teal'c, except what Colonel O'Neill intended for you to see—what your mind wanted to see and believed that it should be seeing."

Sam shook her head vehemently. "I can't believe that you won't even consider the possibility. Teal'c saw him! And I'm probably going to regret admitting this, but I can feel him, and more than once in the past twenty-four hours, I've heard him! What more proof do you need?"

MacKenzie held up the printouts of O'Neill's EEG results. "This is the proof that I need, Captain," he said. "The EEG that Colonel O'Neill himself insisted on having. The one that he said would support his claims that Dr. Jackson's mind had been somehow blended with his own. There is only one set of brainwaves."

Janet stared down at the papers in front of her. She felt completely drained. She had known all along that there was no other way for the situation to end. Daniel was dead; there was no way he could ever return to them.

She looked up and across the table at Sam and Teal'c. What did the situation have to be doing to them? They had lost Daniel, they had lost their commanding officer, and they faced the very real possibility that they were losing Teal'c. Sam was already claiming that she could feel and hear Daniel; it was only a matter of time before she started seeing him as well. And yet …

Janet looked at General Hammond and shook her head. None of this made any sense. Yes, the colonel's EEG had discounted the possibility that Daniel's mind had been joined with his. The scan had been completely normal; there was no sign of any kind of mental illness at all. Teal'c's and Sam's initial EEG's had been normal as well.

Janet shook her head again and looked back down at the table. The entire situation was intolerable, but she could find no logical reason to resist it any longer.

Hammond glanced from Dr. Fraiser to the two remaining members of his premiere team. He too shook his head slowly and lowered his eyes.

"You don't believe us," Sam said suddenly. "None of you do. You don't believe the colonel; you don't believe Teal'c; you don't believe me. You won't even admit there's a possibility that we might be right about this."

"No, Captain, we will not," MacKenzie answered. He looked once from Dr. Fraiser to Hammond before continuing. "What you are saying is not possible."

"You are incorrect," Teal'c insisted. "What we are saying is not only possible but it is, in fact, the truth."

MacKenzie shook his head. "The truth, Mr. Teal'c, is that Dr. Jackson is dead and losing him has driven Colonel O'Neill insane. There is only one decision that can be made."

Sam's head snapped up. "What decision?"

MacKenzie turned to Hammond and pushed a piece of paper toward him. "General, if you would, please? I believe that we should get this over with as soon as possible."

"Get what over with?" Sam asked.

"What is this paper?" Teal'c demanded.

Hammond pointedly ignored their questions as he read the document that MacKenzie had just presented to him. It was an order to remove Dr. Jackson from Colonel O'Neill's custody and place him in Dr. MacKenzie's. In his mind, Hammond knew that there was no other option. His heart, however, was an entirely different matter. He fought to keep his heart from overruling his head as he made his decision. He was a general in the United States Air Force. He was the base commander. He had to act on the evidence that had been presented to him, no matter how much his heart wanted him to ignore it.

He signed his name quickly and shoved the offending document away.

"Thank you, sir." MacKenzie gathered his papers and stood. "I'll go inform the colonel."

A stunned, horrified silence fell over the room as the psychiatrist made his exit. Once he was gone, Teal'c turned to face Hammond.

"What have you done?"

Sam looked away and closed her eyes. "General, sir, please don't tell us that you …"

"I did what had to be done," Hammond replied.

"But, sir, you can't do that!" Sam declared.

Hammond slowly pushed back from the table and stood. "Are you questioning my orders, Captain Carter?"

Sam closed her eyes again and shook her head. "Of course not, sir," she whispered.

Teal'c watched as Sam fought against her urge to challenge the general's decision, and his anger mounted. He had no such limitations on his ability to speak his mind.

"I will question your orders, General Hammond," Teal'c said as he stood. "You have taken away the only protection that Daniel Jackson possessed. You have removed the only person who remained able to speak for him. You have not acted in Daniel Jackson's best interests—you have betrayed him."

"You don't want to do this, Teal'c," Hammond warned. His voice was tight.

"No, sir, he's right." Sam shook her head and pushed herself to her feet. "The colonel was the only person willing to admit what he was feeling." She glanced at Teal'c briefly. He nodded in response, and she continued. "Teal'c and I both knew that Daniel wasn't dead last night. We heard him screaming in the isolation room this morning. We were both too afraid to admit to it, and when the colonel asked us, we denied having felt anything."

"The decision has been made, Captain," Hammond said. "Unless you can prove to me that Dr. Jackson is still alive, it will stand."

"How do we do that, sir? How do we prove to you that something you can't see exists?"

"Find a way, Captain. There's nothing more that I can do. I need more than your belief that Dr. Jackson didn't die on that planet."

"You have already denied the only physical proof that we have to offer you—the eyes of Daniel Jackson."

"Someone else needs to see him, Teal'c. If he's here, then tell him to jump into Colonel O'Neill when someone besides the two of you is looking."

Teal'c shook his head. "This is not possible. The possession of O'Neill's body caused Daniel Jackson great pain. He nearly lacked the strength required to remove himself, and he was unresponsive to O'Neill for thirty minutes afterwards. He awoke only to tell us that he is growing weaker and that we must return him to the planet immediately in order to learn how to return to his body before he dies."

"Teal'c, there's nothing more I can do unless you give me something more to work with. I cannot authorize a trip through the gate to an obviously hostile planet with a dead body in tow. Dr. MacKenzie convinced me of his theory—you didn't. Now, I'm sorry, but that's the way it is."

Hammond turned and walked toward his office.

"Do you think we're all crazy?" Sam asked behind him. "Because that's the only explanation for all three of us thinking and feeling and believing the same thing. Unless we're all three right."

Hammond sighed and paused, but he did not turn around. "Captain, at the moment, I honestly don't know what I think." He continued on toward his door.

"You have condemned Daniel Jackson to death."

Hammond froze in place and closed his eyes, but again he did not turn around.

"I require solitude. I must meditate in order to calm myself before I engage in behavior that I would later regret." Teal'c nodded once at Janet and turned to Sam. "Captain Carter, I shall be in my quarters should you require my assistance."

Sam nodded. Teal'c turned and walked out the door.

"General …"

Hammond spun around, suddenly angry. "Tell me what else to do, Captain! If you were in my place, you would do the same. I have no other options."

"You have to believe us, General—believe in us. Just this once, sir, faith has to be enough, because it's all we've got. Our faith in Daniel is strong enough. Where is your faith in us?"

Hammond exhaled slowly. "Sometimes, Captain," he said quietly. "Faith isn't enough."

"Maybe it doesn't have to be."

Janet's sudden participation in the conversation took Hammond and Sam by surprise. They spun to face her.

"Explain that, Doctor," Hammond said.

"The colonel's EEG was perfectly normal, sir."

Hammond nodded slowly. "Yes, I know that."

"Well, for one thing, that means that there is no evidence that the colonel is suffering from any mental illness at all, let alone DID specifically. It's just not possible."

"So he's not going insane?" Hammond asked.

"No, sir, not according to that EEG. On top of that, I've been sitting here thinking that I should have seen something in that scan that wasn't there, but I couldn't remember why. And then it hit me." Janet looked up. She glanced briefly at Sam and then locked eyes with the general. "The evidence isn't in the EEG scan, sir; it's in his MRI. I remember there being a few small anomalies in Colonel O'Neill's MRI last night – three of them, one larger than the other two - so small that I completely disregarded them. And unless I'm remembering this completely wrong, Teal'c and Captain Carter had anomalies too, sir. Three of them, just like the colonel, and in the same exact place."

"Are you absolutely certain, Doctor?"

"I'll have to go to my office and check them again, but yes, sir, I'm almost positive they're there."

"So you're saying that these anomalies are making them act like this?"

"Yes, sir. But I don't think they're doing it in the way you think they are."

"I don't understand."

"The anomalies are almost identical. That leads me to believe that they were all gotten at the same time, from the same source, and in the same way."

"The beam," Sam said. "While we were in the beam, we could all read each other's thoughts and see through each other's eyes. It was like all four of us were the same person, but we were still ourselves."

Janet nodded in encouragement. Sam turned to face Hammond and continued.

"Dr. MacKenzie was wrong, sir. Those anomalies are proof that Daniel is still alive. At least, one of them is. The colonel and Daniel were in the beam longer than Teal'c and I were. Their connection with each other lasted longer; their anomalies had longer to develop. The larger one … that has to be Daniel."

Hammond's eyes widened in sudden understanding. "So Dr. Jackson is in Colonel O'Neill's mind, in the form of that anomaly?"

"No, sir, I don't think he is. I think Daniel's here on his own, disconnected from his body somehow, but still existing as a separate person. Those anomalies, sir, are why the colonel can see him. They're also why Teal'c and I can feel that he's here and why we can occasionally hear him."

"You're all connected in the same way, just in different amounts?"

"Yes, sir," Janet and Sam said in unison.

Sam continued. "I have a theory, sir, that the energy clouds on 759 are actually human consciousnesses that have been removed from their bodies, exactly the way the colonel and Daniel are saying he was. And I've noticed that since we've returned, the physical reactions that we had to those energy clouds haven't stopped; it's as though one of them followed us through, sir. I think that Daniel has become one of those clouds, somehow, and that it's got something to do with that beam. And now he's here."

"Captain …"

"There's more, sir. I went to the isolation room earlier because I knew I needed to be there. I didn't find out until I got there, but Daniel was in trouble. Teal'c knew that Daniel was unresponsive after he left the colonel's body, even though he couldn't see him any more. The colonel knew that he couldn't disconnect the life support machines last night, before any of us had seen or heard Daniel. And we're all absolutely certain of one thing."

"What?" Hammond asked.

Sam smiled, the first real smile that had crossed her lips all day.

"Daniel's not dead."

Hammond took only seconds to make his decision. As soon as it was made, he felt the weight in his chest disappear, and he knew he was doing the right thing.

"Captain, Doctor, if you'll come with me. I believe we have an appointment with Dr. MacKenzie."


	12. Chapter 12

- - -

Chapter Twelve

- - -

Jack looked down at his watch and then back up at Daniel. "They've been gone a really long time," he observed.

"Yeah," Daniel said. "I know."

Jack walked to the supply cabinet and opened it. He pretended to be inspecting the contents of the shelves as he picked each item up—a roll of tape, a box of gauze, a bottle of rubbing alcohol, a pair of scissors …

"I think it's time to start assuming the worst."

"I know," Daniel repeated softly. "I already am."

The quiet desperation in Daniel's voice prompted Jack to turn around. He was not really surprised to see that Daniel had left his previous position at the door, but he was worried by where Daniel had moved to.

Daniel was standing at the foot of his own bed, staring down at his own dead body. The expression on his face was one of fear, regret, resignation and loneliness.

"Daniel?" Jack asked. "What are you doing?"

Daniel glanced up, flashed a quick smile, and looked back down at himself again. "Nothing, really," he said. "Just thinking."

"About what?" Jack started across the room as nonchalantly as he could manage, tossing a roll of gauze back and forth between his hands.

Daniel shrugged half-heartedly. "Just stuff," he said. "What it's like to be dead, completely and totally and permanently. All the stuff out there that I'm never going to see. All the discoveries that I'll never make. Sha're … This was my last chance to stop this from ever happening again, and I blew it. I thought I could, but I … I was supposed to save myself, but all I did was make absolutely certain that I'm going to die."

Jack stopped directly beside him. He'd been about to ask Daniel what he meant by his last chance, but he decided instead to focus on the last few words he'd said. Daniel was sinking further and further into despair, and Jack wouldn't let him give up so easily. "Hey," he said, pointing his index finger directly at Daniel's chest. "I don't want to hear that."

Daniel shrugged again. "Sorry."

"No, Daniel," Jack said. He dropped his hands to his side. "Look at me."

Daniel did not turn, and Jack tried again.

"Daniel, look at me."

Once again, Daniel did not respond.

"Please, Daniel?"

Daniel sighed and turned to face Jack. There we so many emotions contained in that single sound. Jack heard desperation, fear, resignation, and failure, and those were without even trying.

"What?" Daniel asked half-heartedly.

"Don't give up yet," Jack said softly, with a small smile. "We'll beat this, okay?"

Dr. MacKenzie entered the room, followed by two airmen. Daniel acknowledged Jack's words of comfort and alerted him to the psychiatrist's presence by nodding his head in the direction of the

door.

Jack forced a large smile onto his face and turned around. "Dr. MacKenzie," he greeted cheerfully. "Back so soon? All done trying to sort out those jumbled up brainwaves? When can Daniel and I blow this joint?" Jack motioned toward the airmen, who had taken up positions on either side of the door. "Our escort?"

MacKenzie didn't approach the colonel. He stood in the door and smiled—the false smile of a man who was pretending to be gracious to a defeated opponent.

"Both you and Dr. Jackson will be leaving this room very soon," he said.

Jack was surprised by the statement. He glanced at Daniel and saw that he had not been expecting that answer either.

"We're leaving?" Jack asked. "Going back to the planet? Putting Daniel's brain back in his own body?"

"Not exactly," MacKenzie replied. "You will be leaving, however. Dr. Jackson's body will be moved to the morgue shortly, and you will be transferred to Mental Health within the hour."

"The hell we will," Jack replied evenly. "I haven't granted consent to turn those machines off, and I won't."

"Colonel O'Neill, I outrank you on medical matters. I am giving you one last opportunity to grant consent to disconnect Dr. Jackson from the life support machines."

"Absolutely not."

"In that case, Colonel, the decision is no longer yours to make."

"What?" Jack demanded.

"No …" Daniel whispered.

For the first time, Jack noticed that MacKenzie held a single piece of paper in his hand. His heart sank when he realized what the document most likely contained.

"What's that?" he asked.

MacKenzie smiled again. "This, Colonel, is an order signed by General Hammond. It removes you as Dr. Jackson's guardian, and remands custody of his body to me."

Daniel closed his eyes and turned away. "Can I give up now?"

"No!" Jack answered. He turned to MacKenzie defiantly. "No way in hell," he said. "Hammond knows what's at stake here. He wouldn't do that."

"And yet, he has," MacKenzie said.

Jack seethed. If Hammond had really appointed MacKenzie to be Daniel's guardian, then Daniel was as good as dead. Jack had to convince MacKenzie of the truth, and he had to do it immediately.

"You can't do it," Jack said. "If you turn those machines off, you'll kill him. He's already weaker than he was when we got here yesterday. If he doesn't get back in his body soon, it'll be too late."

MacKenzie's smile returned. "And if I told you that I wanted to talk to Dr. Jackson, would you let me? Would you let him take control of your body again? Can I see his eyes, Colonel?"

"No!" Jack said. "It damn near killed him the first time. If he does it again, he will die."

"Then there's nothing more I can do." MacKenzie stepped forward and began walking directly toward Daniel's bed.

Jack moved until he was standing in front of MacKenzie and blocked his path. "Damn it, MacKenzie, listen to me! You can't do this to him!"

"Colonel, if you don't calm yourself, I will have you restrained and sedated."

"He's going to kill me, isn't he?"

Jack raised his hand toward Daniel, hoping to reassure him. "MacKenzie, stop and listen to me. He's still alive, but he doesn't have much longer. We can save him, but we have got to get him back to that damned planet, and we've got to do it now!"

"Colonel, you know as well as I do that what you're saying isn't possible."

"He's going to kill me," Daniel whispered. He turned away from Jack.

"Don't you dare, Daniel!" O'Neill ordered. "Don't you dare give up. This is not going to happen."

"Colonel, he's not giving up. This is not his fault. You have to let him go. Don't try to make him stay here just to make yourself feel better."

"I'm not doing anything to him! You're the one that's going to kill him!"

"Colonel …" MacKenzie shook his head.

"I see his body. Yes, it's lying on that bed and it's dead. But I see something you don't. I see him—Daniel—standing right beside me, absolutely terrified, because you're about to kill him and there's nothing he can do to stop you!"

"I can't kill him, Colonel. He's already dead."

"No, I'm not!" Daniel cried in despair.

"No, he's not!" Jack echoed. He reached out instinctively to grasp Daniel's shoulders.

Hammond and Sam walked through the infirmary doors just in time to see Jack apparently trying to grab thin air.

Jack stared at his hands as he reached for Daniel once more. He closed his eyes when his fingers passed through Daniel's arms again. He opened his eyes slowly and looked back up. "I can't touch you, can I? I can't touch you when I'm awake," Jack whispered.

Daniel shrugged silently and turned away again, trying to hide his tears.

"No! Daniel, look at me. Damn it, you're not alone! I'm right here, and I'm not going anywhere. Don't you dare shut me out now."

"Sir?" Sam's eyes darted between the stoic psychiatrist and the frantic colonel. "Sir, what's going on?"

"What's going on, Carter? What's going on?" Jack's voice was edgy; his eyes were locked on something beside him that only he could see. "MacKenzie just walked in here and ordered me to pull the plug on Daniel. I said no. Now he says that he's already convinced Hammond to write me off as crazy so he can do it himself. Daniel is standing right here, so he knows that MacKenzie is trying to kill him. And I'm just trying to keep him alive, and no one is listening to me, and I can't even touch him!"

"Colonel O'Neill, that is enough!"

Jack turned toward the sound of his commanding officer's voice. "General, did you do it? Did you give Daniel to MacKenzie?"

Hammond nodded slowly. "Yes, Jack, I did."

"Oh, my God," Daniel breathed. "This is happening. There's nothing you can do, Jack."

"Why would you do that, sir? Why would you order me to stand aside and watch Daniel die?"

"Because I thought there was no other way for this to end," Hammond explained. He locked eyes with Jack from across the room. "But I might have been wrong about that."

"General?" MacKenzie stepped forward. "You were not wrong. Colonel O'Neill is clearly insane …"

"Dr. Fraiser thinks that she might have proof that he's not," Hammond said. "If he's not crazy, then he's right. If he's right, then Dr. Jackson is still alive and I will be rescinding that order."

"What proof?" MacKenzie asked. "Has Dr. Fraiser begun seeing and hearing a dead man, too?"

"No," Janet answered as she walked through the door. "But I am beginning to doubt that Daniel is dead."

"Why?"

"Because of these." Janet held up her hand and showed everyone in the room what she was holding. "These are the initial MRIs that were run on SG-1 immediately after they returned from the planet." Janet turned to Hammond and smiled broadly. "I was right, sir. Teal'c and Captain Carter do each have three anomalies of their own, in the same general location as the colonel's, and their anomalies are identical to each other's."

MacKenzie huffed an exaggerated sigh. "Dr. Fraiser, what bearing do the MRI results of other people have on whether or not the colonel is mentally stable?"

Hammond rolled his eyes and nodded at Janet. "Is there anything else?"

"Yes, sir." Janet could not hide her excitement as she walked to the lightboard. "I missed something last night."

She pressed one of the films in her hand against the board, stepped back, and flipped the switch. The image on the film was a flat line.

Daniel closed his eyes and groaned.

"That's Daniel's," Jack said.

"Yes, Colonel. This is Daniel's EEG. It looks completely flat, which is why I initially missed seeing this. When I studied it more closely just now, I realized that there is some movement." Janet placed another film on the board next to the EEG. "This is Daniel's MRI from last night." She turned around and faced General Hammond. "General, there are three anomalies—two small ones and one larger. And his are identical to Colonel O'Neill's."

Jack turned to Daniel. "Do you understand what she's talking about?"

"Yeah," Daniel answered with a smile. "She just said that I'm real."

"Okay, great," Jack said. He turned to face Hammond again. "Now, about that order, sir … ?"

"General." MacKenzie stepped toward the lightboard. "I have been reviewing Dr. Jackson's scans since last night. I don't know where these 'anomalies' came from, but they are not on any of the six other scans that I have seen."

"Are you accusing Dr. Fraiser of manufacturing these results?" Hammond asked.

"These are the first scans I took," Janet said. "I have already checked them against the others and you're right, they're not on those. The only explanation I can think of is that they must have faded over time, as Dr. Jackson's brain went without activity."

"And that, Dr. Fraiser, is absolutely ridiculous," MacKenzie declared. "Brain-death is not a condition that happens 'over time.' All of Dr. Jackson's brain functions stopped at the same time, including any anomalies that may or may not have been present in his brain before his death."

"Oh, no," Daniel groaned. "Here we go again."

"General, I can understand your unwillingness to face the inevitable conclusion of the events of the past two days, but I cannot and will not allow any more delays in this matter. This is a medical decision, sir, and I do not require your permission to make it."

Hammond bristled at the dismissal. "The hell you don't, Doctor. I am rescinding the order that removes Colonel O'Neill as Dr. Jackson's guardian. Any and all decisions regarding his care are Colonel O'Neill's to make."

"As the colonel's psychiatrist, General, I cannot in good conscience allow him to retain custody of Dr. Jackson. I can declare him incompetent with or without your order, sir."

"You can't do that!" Sam protested.

"Actually, Captain, I can."

"Over my dead body." Jack stepped forward until he once again stood between MacKenzie and Daniel's bed. "No one is touching these machines."

"Colonel, I have already warned you. One more outburst like that, and I will have you restrained."

"I am not going to stand here and let you kill Daniel!"

MacKenzie nodded his head toward Jack, and the two airmen stepped forward, reaching out to grab his arms. Dr. MacKenzie reached into the pocket of his white lab coat and pulled out a syringe.

"No!" Daniel and Jack cried out in unison.

Sam blinked as a hauntingly familiar feeling swept over her.

"Daniel?"

Everyone in the room froze and stared at her.

"Did she hear me?" Daniel asked, leaning toward Jack. Jack's only answer was a shrug.

"Sam?" The question came from Janet, as she reached a hand out and laid it on the other woman's arm.

"Captain Carter, Daniel is dead." MacKenzie said with an exasperated sigh. "This is getting ridiculous."

Sam shook her head, still unable to explain exactly what it was she had felt. "No … no, he's not. He's scared. Terrified." When she looked up at Jack, her eyes were full of tears. "God, he's so scared."

Jack only nodded.

"I … I heard him." A small smile crept across Sam's lips, despite the tears in her eyes. "I can hear him."

"Captain Carter," MacKenzie said, an irritatingly even tone to his voice. "Are you saying that you see Dr. Jackson too?"

"No, sir," Sam admitted reluctantly. "I don't see him. I just … heard him, and felt him."

"Do you hear or feel him now?" Janet asked.

Sam was quiet for a moment, listening for something, and then she shook her head sadly. "No. Not any more."

"It's my emotions!" Daniel announced suddenly. "My connection with her isn't as strong as it is with you. She can only feel powerful emotions. That's why she knew I was here!"

"Well, that's great, Daniel," Jack answered. "Just get yourself powerfully emotional again, and we're outta here. But this time, let's try for abject terror, so maybe some of these other people can feel you too."

MacKenzie sighed loudly. "Colonel O'Neill, it is becoming increasingly apparent that you are no longer in complete control of your faculties."

"My faculties are just fine, MacKenzie. You're just too damned narrow minded to listen!"

"Colonel, your belligerence …"

"Is fully justified at the moment! Listen to me—all of you! Now, I can see him. Carter can hear him. I can see how scared he is, and we both feel it. You're about to kill him, and he's just going to stand here and watch and there's not a damn thing he can do to stop you. Think for just one second about what that's going to do to him. How scared would you be?"

"You continue to suffer from auditory and visual hallucinations …"

"I'm not hallucinating!"

"He's not hallucinating!" Sam and Daniel declared.

"Dr. MacKenzie, I don't think he's hallucinating," Janet said.

"Dr. Fraiser, this man is clearly insane. I am declaring him mentally incompetent. He can no longer be entrusted with decisions regarding his own medical care, let alone that of Dr. Jackson."

"_No_!" The cry that ripped itself from Daniel's lips shredded Jack's heart.

"Daniel …"

"No, Daniel," Sam whispered through tears, feeling Daniel's despair as sharply as if it were her own. "Oh God, Doc, can't you stop this?"

"Dr. Fraiser," MacKenzie began, "you are a trained medical professional. Certainly you of all

people know that what they're saying isn't possible."

"Doctor? Do you hear or feel anything?" It was Hammond's turn to ask the question.

Janet shook her head slowly. "No, sir, I don't." She raised her head and looked the general in the eyes. Her expression made it clear that her mind was made up. "But it's obvious that Colonel O'Neill and Captain Carter do. Between their certainty, Teal'c's claims of having seen him, Captain Carter's theory about the energy clouds, and the MRIs, sir … I think he's here."

MacKenzie motioned to the airmen who held O'Neill's arms. "Restrain the colonel! Be prepared to restrain the others. This madness seems to be spreading."

"Dr. Jackson," Hammond said, hoping against hope that his faith in O'Neill and Carter's perceptions was justified. "You reached Colonel O'Neill; there has to be a way. Just let someone else see you, son."

"Teal'c!" Jack, Daniel and Sam shouted in unison.

"He's in his quarters, meditating," Sam added quickly, watching helplessly as the airmen strapped Jack to the bed.

"Jack, I can't leave you! If he sedates you …"

"You can't stop him, Daniel. You've got to go get Teal'c. He's your only chance."

MacKenzie raised the syringe and tapped it with his fingernail. "I am not devoid of compassion, Colonel O'Neill. I will give the sedative five minutes to take effect before allowing nature to take its course with Dr. Jackson. I will not make you watch."

Jack struggled on the bed, trying to pull his hands free of the restraints. "Get the hell out of here, Daniel. Now!"

Daniel looked back at Jack with wide eyes. He forced a tight smile and nodded before he started backing away.

"Daniel," Janet whispered, and Daniel turned toward the door.

"Go, son," Hammond encouraged as Daniel stepped from the room.

"Hurry, Daniel!" Sam begged; Daniel sprinted toward the elevator.

Jack's voice echoed down the hallway behind him, the effects of the sedative already apparent, and Daniel's feet moved faster than he had ever known they could.

"Run, Danny! For God's sake, run!"

- - -

Daniel burst through the unopened door of Teal'c's quarters a little over two minutes later, neither noticing nor caring that he hadn't opened it first. His eyes focused on Teal'c's still form, and he spoke quickly and breathlessly.

"Teal'c! God, I hope you can hear me. I don't have time to explain, but please, I need your help. In about three minutes, Dr. MacKenzie is going to kill me, and I would really appreciate it if you would stop him."


	13. Chapter 13

- - -

Chapter Thirteen

- - -

"If it is your intention to harm Daniel Jackson, you will do so over my lifeless physical form."

"Dead body, Teal'c," Daniel corrected, looking up quickly from Jack's bedside.

Teal'c turned his head toward Daniel and nodded at him. Daniel returned his worried gaze to Jack's face, and Teal'c turned his attention back to MacKenzie. "Daniel Jackson informs me that the correct phrase is 'over my dead body.' Is it required that I repeat my statement in order for you to understand?"

MacKenzie stared at the man, openly shocked. He had been preparing to terminate the life support when he had found his path to the machines suddenly blocked by one very large, very determined, and obviously very upset Jaffa.

"Mr. Teal'c, I can and will have you restrained and sedated just like Colonel O'Neill. You will stand aside now!"

"I will not," Teal'c replied evenly, fixing the man with his unwavering gaze. "Daniel Jackson has informed me that you are prepared to prematurely end his life. This I refuse to allow."

"Daniel told you that, Teal'c?" Sam asked, stepping toward him. "When?"

"Only two or three moments ago, Captain Carter."

"Did he tell you anything else?" Janet asked.

Teal'c nodded. "He did. On our rapid walk to this room, he said that O'Neill had attempted to stop this course of action and had been forcibly restrained and sedated. And that you, Captain Carter, heard his voice in your mind. Daniel Jackson also believes that you, Dr. Fraiser, and General Hammond knew him to be here, but this man," he indicated MacKenzie with a nod of his head, "refused to listen to you."

"General, sir," Sam said quickly, stepping toward the silent Hammond. "There's no way anyone who wasn't in this room could have known any of that. Teal'c wasn't here, and no one we can see left …"

"Teal'c," Hammond began. "Is Dr. Jackson in this room?"

"He is."

"And you can see him?"

"I can."

"Where is he exactly?"

Teal'c turned back toward Daniel, who was muttering to himself at Jack's side. "He is standing at O'Neill's bedside. He appears quite agitated."

"I can imagine," Hammond said, his voice little more than a mumble. He moved to O'Neill's bed, looking at Teal'c for confirmation that he was in the right place, and at Teal'c's silent nod, he began to speak. "Dr. Jackson … son … I'm sorry. I'm sorry that we didn't believe Colonel O'Neill when he told us what was happening, and I'm very sorry for what you had to stand here and watch us almost do. Twice."

Daniel looked up at the older man and smiled weakly. "It's okay, General. It was kind of a wild story. And I'm sorry too."

"He says it is all right, General Hammond," Teal'c repeated for the sake of the others in the room. "He apologizes as well."

"For what?" Hammond asked the air in front of him, knowing that Daniel could hear him. "Son, you haven't done anything wrong. None of this is your fault."

"I should have tried harder," Daniel said quietly, turning back to Jack, watching his face intently. "I shouldn't have laid this all on Jack."

"Daniel Jackson feels that it was unfair of him to place O'Neill in the position he did."

"Daniel, don't," Sam said, stepping to Jack's other side. "There's no blame in this for you. Don't take any."

"It's our fault, Daniel," Janet added, taking a place at Sam's side. "We didn't listen, and we should have. General Hammond tried to tell me that SG-1 has a way of making the impossible possible. I should have listened to him."

"And I should have listened to Colonel O'Neill," Hammond added.

"And I should have listened to you," Sam whispered, looking directly at where she knew Daniel's eyes would be.

"What none of us should have done, though," Hammond continued with a wave of his hand in MacKenzie's direction, "is listened to him."

"General Hammond," MacKenzie said indignantly. "There is absolutely no way that Dr. Jackson is alive. The only thing keeping his heart beating and his lungs working are those machines that Mr. Teal'c is currently preventing me from disconnecting. You've all obviously been affected by the same madness that has taken control of Colonel O'Neill. And I am fully prepared to take all decisions out of your hands, General."

As he said this, MacKenzie stepped around behind Daniel's bed and grasped the cords that powered the machines that were keeping Daniel's body alive.

Daniel gasped when he realized what MacKenzie intended to do, but before he could speak he felt a strong, reassuring hand on his arm.

"Teal'c, you tell that slimy Freudian worm that if he unplugs those machines, I'll kill him myself."

"What is a Freudian worm, O'Neill?" Teal'c tilted his head as he looked toward the bed that O'Neill's consciousness was rising from, seemingly unperturbed that the man's body wasn't moving.

"Teal'c, he's about to unplug the life support machines you're standing in front of! Just stop him before he kills Daniel!"

Paying no attention to the frozen forms in the room, all of whom were stunned into silence by Teal'c speaking to someone they could plainly see wasn't conscious, Teal'c turned his head in MacKenzie's direction. He saw the man squatted down in front of the power outlet, two heavy cords in his hand.

"Dr. MacKenzie. O'Neill wishes me to inform you that if you terminate the life of Daniel Jackson, he will terminate you."

MacKenzie looked over his shoulder and rolled his eyes. "And do you really believe he would be able to do that, Teal'c?"

"I do not."

"And why not?"

"Can you not plainly see that O'Neill does not currently have access to his physical body?" Teal'c ignored MacKenzie's smile of triumph and continued. "However, I am not similarly incapacitated, and I would have no difficulty in dismembering you in his stead."

"Way to go, Teal'c," Jack said with a smile.

"Hey, guys? Could we maybe have a few less threats? I mean, it's not that I don't appreciate the sentiment but …"

"Daniel, what is MacKenzie trying to do to you over there?"

"Well, he's trying to kill me, but he thinks I'm already dead, so …"

"Daniel Jackson, I do not believe that Dr. MacKenzie believes you to be dead any longer."

"What makes you think that, Teal'c?" Jack asked.

"He is no longer attempting to disconnect the power supplies to the machines."

Jack and Daniel looked up and finally noticed what everyone else in the room had already seen. MacKenzie had removed his hands from the power cords, risen to his feet, and backed away from Daniel's bed.

"He could just be really scared of you, Teal'c."

"That is possible, O'Neill. But it does not matter. The end result is the same. Daniel Jackson will live."

- - -

"This situation is completely unacceptable, General!" MacKenzie declared before Janet had even closed the door to the observation room completely. "I cannot believe that you will allow that … man … to come into that room and threaten me like that!"

Hammond shook his head slowly and tried to hide the smile that threatened to spread across his face. "Teal'c isn't going to dismember you, Doctor."

"How can you be so certain of that? Need I remind you that he's an alien, General? One who was, until a very short time ago, second-in-command to … ?"

"No, Doctor, you don't," Hammond interrupted with no small amount of heat, his good humor suddenly gone. "Teal'c's loyalty is not in question here. He swore an oath to protect and defend this planet and I have no doubt that he will hold himself to it." Hammond's voice rose in conjunction with his mounting anger. "What is at issue is that this oath also extends to the members of his team, Doctor, and in the past twenty-four hours, you have developed a very nasty habit of threatening to kill one of them. Repeatedly, I might add. And convincing me to do the same!"

"You can't kill someone who is already dead!"

Hammond jerked his hand through the air in a gesture of dismissal. "Doctor, this is no longer open for discussion. After what we just saw, the official record will read: Dr. Jackson did not die on P2A-759 as previously believed. His consciousness was somehow removed from his body, requiring a return trip by SG-1 for the purpose of discovering how to reverse the process."

"General, that is not only absurd, it is completely without basis! And as ranking medical officer in this case, I refuse to allow it to happen."

Hammond glared at the other man and his face flushed. "Do you seriously expect to overrule me on this?"

"Dr. MacKenzie," Janet interrupted, keeping her voice intentionally soft, momentarily derailing Hammond's anger. "If you believed what SG-1 is saying, would you withdraw your objection?"

MacKenzie gave a single, curt nod. "Absolutely."

"Then what would it take to convince you? It seems that Colonel O'Neill and Teal'c both seeing him and talking to him, Captain Carter hearing him and the physical evidence of the parallel anomalies in their MRIs isn't enough. What more proof do you need?"

"I would need to see him for myself, Dr. Fraiser," he answered without hesitation.

"What if that weren't possible?" Janet asked. "I think we can say with no small amount of certainty that no one outside of the three remaining members of SG-1 is going to be able to see him."

"Then I'll never believe it, because it isn't possible."

"But what if, instead of seeing him for yourself, you were in total and complete control of a person who could? If that person couldn't lie to you, even if she wanted to, and if hallucination weren't even a possibility? Would that satisfy you?"

MacKenzie nodded. "Yes. If I were in total control of the situation and knew that the subject had to be telling me the absolute truth, that I could accept."

"What are you thinking, Dr. Fraiser?" General Hammond asked.

Janet leaned forward and triggered the microphone, allowing SG-1 to hear her in the isolation room below.

"Captain Carter?"

"Yes?" Sam answered.

"Captain, would you consent to Dr. MacKenzie hypnotizing you again?"

It was Teal'c who answered first, though the words obviously weren't his own. "O'Neill says, 'No way in h …' "

"Why?" Sam asked, silencing Teal'c with a motion of her hand. "Colonel, this might be important."

Teal'c tilted his head and raised an eyebrow as he turned his head to the right and stared at something only he could see. He blinked twice before turning back toward Sam.

"O'Neill expresses … severe doubt at that possibility."

Janet felt the urge to giggle at Teal'c's translation of the colonel's protest, which she had no doubt contained a much larger string of invectives than Teal'c would ever feel comfortable repeating. She turned the microphone on again.

"Captain, I have a theory."

"Okay."

"We're all aware that the colonel woke up from his sedation this morning with the apparently sudden ability to see Daniel, when before he'd only been able to hear him, and that, only occasionally."

Sam nodded slowly, not completely understanding where Janet was going with this. "Right."

"And now, Teal'c can see him too. Teal'c," Janet turned her attention from Sam to the Jaffa. "What exactly were you doing the first time you saw Daniel?"

"I was … meditating is the word you would use."

"Was it a deep meditation, Teal'c? Was your subconscious mind engaged?"

"It was," Teal'c answered with a nod.

Sam's face brightened in sudden understanding. "You're thinking that if I'm hypnotized, if we put my subconscious mind in control, that I'll be able to see him too?"

"That's my theory, Captain," Janet answered.

"Then yes," Sam said. "If there's a chance that I'll be able to see Daniel, and prove to everyone that he's here, then yes."

"Thank you, Captain," Janet replied. "We'll be right down."

"Captain Carter, O'Neill believes that you are placing too much trust in Dr. MacKenzie. He wishes to have no more members of SG-1 placed under the care of this … winged, aquatic animal?"

Sam smiled. "I think he said 'quack', Teal'c. Colonel, I know you don't trust Dr. MacKenzie right now, and I don't blame you. But I think Dr. Fraiser is right. I think that once we see Daniel with our subconscious, then we can just see him. It certainly does seem that that's what worked for you and Teal'c. And if hypnotizing me is what it takes to convince Dr. MacKenzie that we're telling the truth, then I'm more than willing to do it."

- - -

"All right, Captain. When I count to three, you will open your eyes, and you will tell me exactly what you see. One, two, three."

Sam opened her eyes slowly and looked around the isolation room. She saw him immediately; he was standing right in front of her. Her eyes filled with tears even as a broad smile crossed her face. She ignored everyone else in the room as she stood and walked toward him. He smiled back at her and nodded.

"Hi, Sam."

Her breath caught in her throat as happiness threatened to overwhelm her; tears of joy and laughter mingled together as she came face-to-face with the truth she had known all along, but had convinced herself was impossible.

"Captain?" MacKenzie prompted from behind her. "What are you seeing?"

"Daniel," she answered without hesitation. "It's Daniel." She pulled her eyes away from his face for only a second, to share a brief smile with the other non-corporeal person in the room. "And Colonel O'Neill."

"You see Daniel and the colonel lying in their beds?" MacKenzie asked.

"No," she said, shaking her head. "No, they're both standing."

"Where are they?"

"Daniel is right in the middle of the room, about two feet in front of me. The colonel is standing beside him."

MacKenzie turned toward Janet and General Hammond in shock. His eyes were wide and his mouth hung open. As if realizing how ridiculous he must look, he snapped his mouth shut quickly, only to open it again to speak.

"General, Doctor, I … I don't know what to say … I didn't think it … It's just not possible …"

"And yet," Janet said, "it's true."

"Yes," MacKenzie admitted, obviously reluctant but at last unable to argue any further. "Yes, it appears that it is." He sighed again and turned back toward Sam. She'd not moved since he'd turned away, but she was deep in conversation with two people that she shouldn't have been able to speak to at all—Daniel Jackson and Jack O'Neill. One was dead, the other was heavily sedated and unconscious, but apparently those facts meant nothing.

"Captain," MacKenzie said, "I do hate to interrupt, but I'm going to wake you up now."

Sam nodded without taking her eyes away from whatever—or whoever—it was she was looking at so intently. "This is the part where we cross our fingers," she said. "If I'm right, I'll still see you when I'm awake. If I'm wrong …" She swallowed hard and took a step backwards. "If I'm wrong, I'll see you when you get back." Sam wiped her cheeks and nodded to MacKenzie.

"Close your eyes, Captain. When I snap my fingers, you will wake up, and you will remember everything that happened. One, two …"

MacKenzie snapped his fingers.

Sam stood for a moment, breathing deeply, with her eyes still closed. She looked almost afraid to open them. She did remember everything, just as MacKenzie said she would, but there was a small part of her that was worried that it all might have been a dream, or an hallucination, and that when she opened her eyes it would only be to find that Daniel was still dead, the colonel was still insane, and she and Teal'c were following him down that path.

"I'm not dead, Sam."

Her eyes shot open when she heard him, and she breathed a deep sigh of relief when she realized she was still staring directly into the most beautiful blue eyes she had ever seen, made all the more beautiful by the fact that she'd spent more than twenty-four hours thinking she'd never see them again.

"And you're not crazy," Daniel added with a smile.

"Well, no crazier than you were ten minutes ago, anyway," Jack interjected.

"I can still see them," Sam announced to the room.

Janet and Hammond shared a broad smile of relief and happiness. SG-1 might not have been entirely corporeal, but they were still whole. Janet's expression changed to one of near-contempt as she glanced at Dr. MacKenzie, but the smile was back on her face before she turned and walked across the room, on her way to the newly reunited SG-1.

Dr. MacKenzie turned to General Hammond, determined to make his exit as quickly and with as much dignity as he possibly could. "General, I believe I've done all I can here. If you'll excuse me …"

Hammond motioned for silence, stopping the psychiatrist from making his departure. "Oh no, Dr. MacKenzie, I don't think you're quite finished yet."

MacKenzie looked from Hammond to the visible half of SG-1 and back again. "I withdraw my objections, General, and reverse my previous orders. Colonel O'Neill is of sound mind and body, and he is more than competent enough to make all decisions regarding Dr. Jackson's medical care. However, that hardly seems necessary, now that Dr. Jackson himself is able to express his wishes …"

"Oh, I don't care about that," Hammond interrupted. "I'd already decided that I'd have had you forcibly removed from this base if you'd persisted." MacKenzie had the good grace to not look offended at that. "No, Doctor, I'm talking about the apologies you owe."

Dr. MacKenzie swallowed visibly and looked disturbed by the prospect. "Apologies, General? Certainly you can understand, sir, I was only doing my job …"

"You tried to kill Dr. Jackson—repeatedly. You ignored SG-1 every single time they tried to explain to you what was going on. When they came to you with actual physical proof, you claimed that Colonel O'Neill had multiple personalities and that Teal'c and Captain Carter were both delusional." Hammond's voice was cold and emotionless, but when he leaned closer to MacKenzie, the anger in his eyes was plainly visible. "And what's worse, Doctor, is that you convinced me to listen to you. You convinced me to ignore my faith in my own people. And you damn near convinced me to let you kill Daniel."

Hammond leaned even closer, so that only MacKenzie could hear what he was saying, and smiled. It wasn't a friendly smile, however, and it sent a shiver down the psychiatrist's spine.

"If you ever meddle in the affairs of my command or my people again, Doctor, I'll have you giving couples therapy to penguins by the end of the day. Is that clear?"

"Perfectly, sir."

"Good." Hammond nodded and then added, almost as an afterthought, "Oh, yes … I think if I were you, after I'd apologized, I'd stay as far away from SG-1 as possible. I don't think Teal'c likes you very much, and you know how testy those Jaffa can be."


	14. Chapter 14

- - -

Chapter Fourteen

- - -

Dr. MacKenzie had delivered reluctant but sincere apologies to three of the four members of SG-1, but when it came time for the fourth, he hesitated. He appeared to be contemplating the correct words to use, but from the look on his face, it was obvious to everyone else in the room that he would never find them. How did anyone apologize for what he had nearly done? How could any words possibly even begin to make amends?

After several moments of silence, he finally shook his head in defeat. "Dr. Jackson, I know it's not much, and it's not nearly enough, but for what it's worth, I am sorry."

Daniel opened his mouth to accept, but realized quickly that it would be pointless to do so. Even if Dr. MacKenzie had been able to hear him, it wouldn't have mattered.

The psychiatrist was already gone.

The silence of the isolation room was broken seconds later when Teal'c turned toward Jack and said, "O'Neill, I am most curious about the gesture you directed at Dr. MacKenzie before he departed. What is the significance of this one finger?"

Janet smothered a giggle; Sam blushed; Daniel coughed; Jack grinned.

Hammond shook his head and would have laughed if not for the continued seriousness of the situation. "It means something that I'd have to reprimand the colonel for saying to another officer, Teal'c. But since I didn't see it, that means it didn't happen, right, Colonel?" He imagined that he could hear Jack's largely perfunctory and decidedly unapologetic apology.

Hammond allowed everyone in the room a few seconds to enjoy the lightness of the moment before he turned his attention to the serious matter at hand. When he felt the time was right, he turned toward Janet.

"Dr. Fraiser, is it possible to take Dr. Jackson's body through the stargate with portable life support?"

Janet nodded. "Yes, sir. It will take about an hour for me to get the logistics sorted out and assemble a medical team to accompany us, but it's entirely possible."

"All right, then." Hammond addressed the two visible members of SG-1, plus the two he couldn't see. "SG-1, you have a go for a return mission to P2A-759. We'll classify it as a search and rescue mission for Dr. Jackson, because under the circumstances, I think that's the best we're going to be able to come up with. You'll leave just as soon as Dr. Fraiser has her medical team assembled." He looked at Sam and Teal'c and nodded toward Jack's and Daniel's gurneys. "If you'll excuse me, I do have a few details to take care of before the mission. I'll be in my office should any of you need me."

Hammond turned and walked toward the door, but stopped just short of it and turned around. "Dr. Jackson … I'm so sorry for what happened here today, son. And I'm glad you're still with us." He nodded once more, and then was gone.

"And if you'll all excuse me," Janet said, "I've got a medical detail to get organized, and a whole lot of machinery to get together."

Janet walked out the door and SG-1 was left alone.

The four of them stood close together, simply looking at each other in silence, each privately enjoying the fact that the other three were there with them. It was Sam who finally broke the silence.

"Well, we've got an hour before we leave, and it won't take Teal'c and me long to get ready to go, so why don't we make the most of that time?"

"What are you thinking, Carter?" Jack asked. He knew he could always count on his two scientists to keep conversation flowing, but the way Daniel was looking, Jack didn't know if the archeologist had it in him any more.

"I'm thinking, sir, that maybe if we combine our memories of things that happened the last time we were on 759, we might have an easier time of figuring out what we need to do this time. We also need to talk out and nail down exactly which theories have been disproved, and which still stand; the ones that are still viable, sir, I think we should consider the most likely explanations for what happened."

"All right, then," Jack said. He settled himself to the floor and leaned back against Daniel's bed once more. Daniel, standing beside him, did the same. Sam and Teal'c sank to the floor across from them; Sam leaned against Jack's bed.

"The most obvious issue, I think, is: how did Daniel end up separated from his body in the first place?"

Daniel lifted his head slowly. "You actually all know that already," he said. "You watched it happen."

Jack shook his head. "No, Daniel. We watched you have a heart attack and die while Carter was dialing."

Daniel returned the negative response he'd just gotten. "No, Jack, you all saw what happened. You just don't remember."

"Why would we forget something like that, Daniel?" Sam asked. "How _could_ we forget something like that?"

Daniel closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the bed. "Think about it, Sam. Look at everything Belos can do, everything he did to us. Is it really that hard to believe that he could influence memories?"

"The being Nem was able to influence memory," Teal'c observed.

Daniel nodded slowly. "And we know that Nem's mate, Omaroca, was here on Earth at the same time Belos was. And since he killed her, it's logical to assume that he knew who she was, and possibly had access to whatever technology she brought here with her. If she brought one of those memory machines with her, and he managed to find it after she died …"

Sam nodded in understanding and finished the thought for him. "It's possible that he adapted it for his own uses and took it to 759 with him."

"And just because that nifty little memory thing is the only toy we saw Nem play with, it doesn't mean that it's all he had."

Daniel and Teal'c nodded in agreement, and Sam leaned forward, clearly excited. "Sir, do you know what that means? It's entirely possible that everything that happened to us on that planet, everything we saw … it could all be the result of technology that one of our allies possesses!"

"Perhaps in time … ," Jack muttered.

Silence descended again, and only the constant sounds coming from the life support machines marked its passing. Sam was beginning to worry that Daniel had fallen asleep. The events of the preceding twenty-four hours had taken a serious toll on him, and though they should make it back to the planet within the hour, it was beginning to look as though it wouldn't be soon enough.

She opened her mouth to ask Daniel if he was going to be all right, but he was speaking before she could.

"I think I know how we might be able to do this."

"Do what?" Jack asked.

"We have to do it together," Daniel whispered, and then shook his head. "I don't know how I know that—I've never known how I knew that—but I do. I think I always have."

"Do what together?"

"Okay, think back to the planet. When we first got there … those energy readings that were floating around … how did we react to them?"

"What does that have to do with anything?" Jack asked.

"Well, let's go with Sam's theory that those energy things are just like me—they're people's consciousnesses that somehow ended up without their bodies. Aynad told me, in my dream, that Belos stole people's bodies. That's what the inscriptions on the walls said, too. So what if, rather than a symbiote, Belos is actually a consciousness that doesn't have a body of his own? What if he's one of those energy clouds, just like I am?"

Jack shook his head. "Still not following you, Daniel."

"Just … do this."

Daniel reached out with his left hand and grabbed Jack's right. Jack looked down at their intertwined fingers and raised his eyebrows. "We have to hold hands?"

Daniel glared at him, and Jack looked away. "Sam, Teal'c, you need to do it, too." Sam and Teal'c laced their fingers together exactly as Daniel had done with Jack. "Now … everybody think of the same thing. Start with reaching the stargate … Jack and Teal'c have just put the stretcher down on the ground, okay? Now close your eyes." All three of them did as Daniel said, and nodded when they'd reached that point in their memories. "Now, Jack … lean over and touch Teal'c's leg."

Jack cleared his throat. "Are you sure this is necessary? Aren't we getting just a bit …"

"Just do it, Jack!"

"Okay, okay." Jack opened one eye and leaned forward. He placed his left hand on Teal'c's knee, and wasn't surprised when his hand actually sunk into the other man's leg. "That is so creepy," he muttered as he closed his eyes again.

"Everybody hang on," Daniel said. "Here we go."

He leaned forward just as Jack had done, and brought his right hand down against Sam's leg.

- - -

Teal'c was standing on the plain at the foot of the Stargate on P2A-759. He'd stepped away from the others after helping O'Neill settle Daniel Jackson to the ground and was scanning the horizon for signs of pursuit. He knew that the MALP had indicated that the planet was uninhabited, and they had been on the planet throughout the day without having encountered anything that would contradict that finding.

He decided that his vigilance was unwarranted and turned to return to his team.

The hair on the back of his neck stood up, and he felt a hard, malevolent gaze boring into his back.

Someone, or something, was watching them.

He turned back around slowly, reaching out with all of his senses as he tried to determine just where the threat lay. He felt his symbiote move restlessly within him. Teal'c strained his ears and eyes, searching for the presence that every other sense told him was there, but he neither saw nor heard anything.

"Teal'c?"

"Something is wrong in this place, O'Neill," Teal'c answered carefully. "I feel as though we are being watched, but there is no one present."

Teal'c felt the presence again, closer than before, and he spun toward where he felt it to be. Teal'c's symbiote stirred again, and he knew that, whatever it was, it was much nearer to them than he could have imagined. He closed his eyes and concentrated …

… and she felt the energy prickling at her back again.

It was a familiar feeling already, after having spent the entire afternoon following the energy signatures around the temple. She could feel them clearly; the air almost crackled with their presence.

Sam looked up from the DHD and glanced across at her teammates. Teal'c appeared on edge; Jack was studying the air in front of him. Both looked as though they were scanning the area for a threat and preparing to defend themselves from it. She felt the sensation of an approaching energy signature, but it wasn't as familiar this time. It was cold, dark, evil …

Sam knew, without knowing how, that she was feeling the energy from two different angles, seeing the scene through two different sets of eyes. She looked across at Teal'c, and was shocked to realize that not only was she looking at her friend and teammate, she was looking back at herself.

As she tried to grapple with the shock of seeing the planet through Teal'c's eyes as well as her own, she felt a wave of coldness approaching. She took one step back and shivered as she felt it course through her.

"What was that?" she heard Jack ask.

Sam opened her mouth to answer him, but something else caught her attention. Out of the corner of her eye she could see a building energy surge, identical to the one she had seen in the anteroom of the temple when the beam had ensnared Jack and Daniel. At the same time, she felt Teal'c's symbiote reacting to the energy's presence, and she knew that somehow this energy source was responsible for its agitated state. Teal'c's impressions of being watched were stronger now, and his eyes were locked on the energy mass that he hadn't been able to see before.

It was hanging directly above Daniel's chest, and tendrils of energy sparked and spiked and snaked their way toward him. Long fingers of lightning stretched out from the central mass, forming hands of electricity that danced above Daniel's unconscious body.

"Sir!" she cried out as a deep feeling of panic and terror flooded through her …

… and he heard Sam's frightened cry from behind him. "Daniel!"

Jack pushed the fear aside and looked down at where Daniel lay on the stretcher. Jack remembered having seen nothing above Daniel except the unexplainable shadow, but where before there had been only empty air, suddenly Jack saw the ball of energy. It changed form as he watched it, and in combination with the visions of the energy from Sam's mind, and the impressions of location he was getting from Teal'c, Jack's shadows suddenly took the form of a body—two huge arms, two massive legs, a huge chest, a head, a face, fangs and horns, eyes … He felt it staring at them, and he saw it reaching for Daniel. He saw Teal'c and Sam watching him, watching the energy form, and he knew that they were both trying to understand what was happening.

Jack knew what was happening, though. This had been part of his dream the night before—the night he'd first seen Daniel.

The night Daniel had shown him exactly what had happened to him on the planet.

Jack wanted to close his eyes and turn away, but knew that he couldn't. He wanted to pull Daniel away from the danger, but knew that it was too late. He wanted to scream, or run, or shoot something, but knew that it would be pointless.

This had already happened, and there was nothing any of them could do to change it.

Suddenly, the energy fingers darted out and slammed into Daniel's chest. Daniel's eyes shot open and he gasped in a single deep breath. As the hands withdrew, his whole body jerked violently. All three stood frozen as the energy being raised its hands above its head. They saw the limp, misty form clasped in those fingers, and then Daniel's body became completely still. His eyes fell shut as his chest sank slowly, and the sound of the air escaping his lips carried all the way to Jack's ears. The shadowy energy being looked directly at Jack and smiled at him, a smile that dripped with evil. Its eyes flashed once before it dissipated and then was gone …

… and it was then that Daniel realized that his body wasn't breathing any more.

"No!" he heard Jack cry out.

Daniel looked around himself, trying to force down the terror that gripped him as he stared at his own pale face and his own lifeless body.

"Your soul has been gathered for the glory of your god," a voice hissed in his ear. "You have been greatly honored by your god this day."

"Get that damn gate open! Now!"

Daniel jerked his head around and looked up at the dark face that stared down at him. He shook his head slowly and backed away.

"You shall be the one to carry your God to your world. You shall become the vessel for your god's greatness."

"Get ready to run."

Daniel saw the dark fingers reaching for his chest, and he tried to back away again. His feet were sluggish, and he tripped over them, falling to the ground, hard, at the thing's feet. Daniel felt an odd sensation in his chest, as though it were suddenly inflating without him drawing a breath, and he saw the thing hesitate.

"Damn it! Carter!"

Daniel pushed the fear aside with effort, and knew that there would be no escaping from this monster. The thing reached for him again; there was nothing to stop it. He felt the cold fingers penetrate his chest and wrap around something inside of him. The pain, loss, and terror were overwhelming.

"No!" Daniel cried out.

"Wait! One second!"

Daniel felt another sensation in his chest—five forced heartbeats followed by a snapping and a sharp pain. The thing threw its head back and bellowed in anger. It began to waver and lose its form, and Daniel took advantage of the momentary distraction.

"Go! Go!"

Daniel pushed himself past the thing with every ounce of strength he possessed.

"Come on, Daniel. Come on!"

"I'm coming!"

Daniel ran as fast as he could, but his team seemed to be too far ahead of him, and he forced himself to run faster. He heard a roar of anger behind him, and spared just a second to look back. He stumbled when he saw the thing still standing on the open plain—the dark, electric shadow that held in one hand a vaguely human form that glowed brightly against the darkness of the thing that held it. Another energy form, brighter than either of the others, hovered just behind them, moving toward them quickly.

Daniel turned back to the gate just in time to see Sam disappear through it. He leapt up the stairs two at a time. Jack stepped through. Daniel didn't slow down.

Just before Teal'c was swallowed by the wormhole, Daniel launched himself into it head first.

- - -

Four pair of eyes opened in perfect unison. Jack, Sam and Teal'c all wore small smiles of understanding, and Daniel exhaled in relief when he saw them. He was no longer the only one that knew the importance of returning to the planet.

Jack's smile faded quickly and was replaced by a mask of anger and hatred. "That slimy snake son of a bitch," he muttered. "He pulled you out of your body."

"And we watched it happen," Sam said softly. "This whole time, we've each known one thing about what happened, one piece of the puzzle. We just had to put them together to see the whole picture."

"Belos must have manipulated our memories," Teal'c said. "Until this moment, I had no conscious memory of any of these events."

Daniel nodded his head. "He did, Teal'c. He couldn't risk any of you remembering, because if you'd remembered, you'd have gone back."

"Wait … wouldn't he want us to come back?" Jack asked. "We've got your body. If he needs it …"

"You weren't supposed to take my body from the planet," Daniel answered. "His plan was to make you forget about me entirely. It just didn't work the way he thought it would."

"Why was he not successful?" Teal'c asked.

"There were other forces acting against him right then," Daniel said.

"Like what?" Jack asked.

"Well, like us, for starters. The four of us … the beam blended our consciousnesses together in such a way and to such an extent that he wasn't able to overcome it entirely. He couldn't completely separate us. And then there was Aynad. He was there, too."

"But why does he need your body anyway?" Sam asked.

Daniel sighed and closed his eyes once more, as though the memories he was accessing were painful to him. "He needs it because he's trapped," he said, leaning back against the bed again. "The race that moved the people from Egypt to that planet was incredibly powerful. One thing that they learned to do was to separate their consciousnesses from their bodies, willingly. Belos was after power, just like any Goa'uld would be. He left Earth not long after he killed Omaroca, and he took what technology of hers he could carry with him. Using that technology, he figured out how to get his consciousness out of his body, and his body died, but then he realized that he couldn't leave the planet."

"He could not operate the stargate," Teal'c said.

Daniel nodded again. "He needed a body to dial the DHD. So he started using other people's,

thinking that it would be easy just to take over. But it wasn't easy; the bodies couldn't go for more than a few minutes before they died. A human body can only support one consciousness at a time … which is exactly why I should never have tried jumping into you, Jack."

Jack smiled smugly. "Can I say 'I told you so' now?"

"No," Daniel answered, and continued. "Belos experimented with the people, teaching himself how to remove their consciousnesses, but he couldn't get it right. If he took too much or not enough, the body couldn't survive long enough for him to reach the stargate. He killed roughly a third of the population without ever figuring out just what he needed to do. Until the last one—until Aynad."

"You keep talking about him," Jack said. "Who is he?"

"He's the one I met in my dream," Daniel explained. "The one who taught me everything I know about that planet, and about Belos. He's the only one that Belos managed to completely separate from his body. That made Belos entering his body possible, but it also gave Aynad the powers that Belos had wanted for himself."

"So why didn't he use that body to leave the planet?" Sam asked.

"Because he underestimated the people," Daniel answered. "By the time Belos took control of Aynad's body, the people knew exactly what was going on, and they stopped him from reaching the stargate. Belos killed half the people in the village that day, including Aynad's entire family. But they didn't die in vain. They managed to mortally wound Aynad's body; Belos couldn't save it. He had to leave it, or he'd have died with it."

"Why didn't he just do it again?" Jack asked. "He still had the other half of the village."

"He killed them," Daniel answered. "He was so angry with them for what they did to him that he killed every single one of them. In the end, he trapped himself there, and he's spent the last four thousand years waiting and planning for the day someone would walk through the stargate."

"And we showed up for the party; lucky us," Sam said. "It was almost like it was designed to guarantee that we'd be interested enough to explore it. Almost like he was trying to lure us, specifically, into coming through the gate."

"Step into my parlor …" Jack mumbled.

"So, you're his last chance, aren't you?" Sam asked of Daniel. "If he doesn't get your body, he'll be trapped there until someone else comes through the gate."

"And if we blow that damned gate up before we leave …" Jack began.

"Belos is aware that he will be trapped forever if he is unsuccessful in his attempt to steal your body."

Daniel nodded. "And the only way to fix what he's done to me is to walk right back into that parlor again."

"Wait a minute," Jack said. "If you've known all of this since that dream you had on the planet, then why didn't you tell me before? This would have been so much easier to explain to everyone else if I'd known what I was talking about."

Daniel shrugged and flashed Jack a weak smile. "I didn't understand it all myself – not really. Aynad showed me exactly what had happened to his people, shared his memories of Belos with me, and told me everything that Belos had done, but I didn't understand what any of it had to do with me. I thought it was just a dream, that it didn't really mean anything."

"Why do we have to go back, Daniel?" Sam asked. "What's preventing you from just … jumping back into your body the way you did the colonel's?"

"Because I didn't leave that body, Sam," Daniel answered. "The consciousness was removed from it forcefully, against my will. I managed to get past Belos to come here but there's another part of me, a very large part of me, that's still there with him. That part of me and the secret to making me whole again are in that temple. And the longer I stay separated, the weaker I get."

Jack shook his head slowly and spoke one sentence that summed up everyone's thoughts on the matter perfectly.

"Well, that sucks."


	15. Chapter 15

- - -

Chapter Fifteen

- - -

Janet walked into the isolation room like a woman with a mission—which she was. She had finished working out the logistics involved in taking Daniel's body through the stargate, and it was time to put her plan into action. She was proud that her hesitation upon seeing two members of SG-1 sitting on the floor, leaning against the colonel's bed, and talking to thin air was so slight that she was certain none of them had noticed.

She'd be very glad to have both the colonel and Daniel whole, well, and corporeal again.

"Colonel O'Neill?" she asked the air. "Is it possible for you to return to your own body? Can you wake yourself up?"

Sam nodded, and Teal'c said, "He says that it is possible. He has done it once before."

Janet smiled. "I was thinking he had. He woke up from his previous sedation just a bit too quickly for it to have been anything else. Colonel, we'll be ready to go in fifteen minutes. It would help immensely if you were able to take yourself through the stargate. So if you would, sir?"

Sam and Teal'c stood and stepped away from Jack's bed. Janet took that as a sign that the colonel was preparing to return to his body, and she turned back into the corridor and toward the infirmary, to finish gathering her supplies.

"Let's go see the wizard," Jack said. He rose to his feet smoothly, and was relieved to see a smiling Daniel do the same. He grasped Daniel's arm once more, ignoring how strange the contact felt and struggling with the conflicting thoughts that filled his head. He knew that the only way to return Daniel to the physical plane involved Jack returning to it himself, but he also knew how difficult the separation would be for both of them. Once Jack had entered his body again, such a simple thing as reaching out to touch Daniel's arm, something Jack had taken for granted only twenty-four hours earlier, would be impossible. Daniel nodded back at him, and Jack knew that he understood.

Jack released Daniel's arm reluctantly and walked over to his bed. He settled himself on it and was just beginning to lay down when he heard Daniel calling to him.

"Jack …"

The voice was suddenly weak—much weaker than it had been only a moment before. Jack turned his head and was shocked to see that Daniel, who had risen to his feet so easily, was only managing to stay on them by leaning heavily against the other bed.

"Daniel?" he asked as he stopped in mid-motion, his concern obvious.

"Jack, I … I don't …"

Jack reacted quickly when Daniel faltered, swung his feet back over the side of the bed, and sat up straight again. "You don't what?"

Daniel didn't answer, his face a mask of immeasurable agony. His lips were moving, but no sound escaped them. His eyes, wide and filled with terror, locked onto Jack's, begging him for help.

Jack jumped from the bed and stepped forward, but drew back when he realized that he didn't even know what was happening. "Daniel? What's wrong?"

"Dr. Fraiser!" Sam and Teal'c called out in unison.

Daniel clutched his hands to his chest, grabbing at his heart. He looked down at them, and then back up. "Jack …" he gasped, reaching out with his right hand and giving voice to the plea Jack had seen in his eyes. "Help me …"

Jack reached out instinctively. "Daniel?"

Daniel took two staggering steps forward before collapsing to his knees. He pressed his clenched fists more tightly against his chest, and his eyes widened further. Teal'c and Sam both knelt beside him, opposite Jack, but without the ability to touch him, neither knew exactly what to do for him. Jack reached out, grabbed him by the shoulders and kept him from falling to the floor.

"Captain!" Janet demanded, her eyes riveted to the two people on their knees in front of her. "Teal'c, what's going on? What's wrong?"

Sam glanced up from Daniel to answer Janet, but she suddenly pointed toward Daniel's bed and cried out, "Doc!"

Janet spun and was shocked by the sight of Daniel's body—Daniel's lifeless body—jerking spasmodically on the bed. "What the hell … ?"

The stunned tone of Janet's question and the horrified look on Sam's face made Jack and Teal'c snap their heads around toward Daniel's bed, but just as they did a cry of pure anguish ripped itself from Daniel's throat. Jack felt Daniel fall away from him, an eerie reminder of being released from Belos' beam the day before.

Jack turned back to find Daniel crumpled on the floor, his hands clutched even more tightly to his chest. "What the hell is going on here?" Jack demanded.

"What's happening to him?" Janet asked at the exact same moment.

Teal'c and Sam rose slowly to their feet and moved over to stand beside Janet. None of them could believe what they were seeing, and all three stared down at Daniel's body in astonishment.

Jack looked up from Daniel just long enough to say, "Carter, what is it? What are you guys seeing over there?"

"Sir, I …" Sam couldn't continue her explanation, both because she couldn't describe it and because she had absolutely no idea what was happening, even though it was happening right before her eyes.

Janet shuddered, forcing herself into action. After paging the trauma team to the isolation room, she ran to Daniel's body to assess the situation. She pulled the blankets away and ripped his gown open to his waist so that she could more clearly visualize what was happening to him.

Daniel moaned deeply and tried to roll away from Jack's touch, but Jack wouldn't let him go. He grasped Daniel's arm more tightly with his right hand and rolled him partway over, until Daniel's back was propped against the front of Jack's legs. He reached down with his other hand and pushed the hair that had fallen across Daniel's face out of the way.

"Hang in there, buddy," Jack whispered urgently. "We're gonna beat this, remember? Doc said we're outta here in fifteen. You can hang on that long; you have to."

Without moving either hand, Jack jerked his head up and looked at Sam angrily. "Damn it, Carter, what the hell is happening over there?"

Sam opened her mouth to answer, but closed it again, and simply shook her head. Teal'c looked from Daniel's bed down to Jack, his expression somber, and answered.

"In the past few moments, several wounds have appeared on Daniel Jackson's body."

"Wounds?" Jack asked in confusion as the trauma team Janet had paged burst into the room, literally running right through him and Daniel. Jack shuddered at the sensation and then looked up at Teal'c again. "What do you mean wounds?"

Sam and Teal'c had moved away from Daniel's bed to give the trauma team room to work. Jack noticed several bewildered looks that passed between the medical personnel. He knew that the situation was odd—not only were wounds spontaneously appearing on one of their patients, but that patient was actually dead. They couldn't possibly understand why Dr. Fraiser had summoned a trauma team to attend to an already dead body.

Sam knelt down across from Jack and reached for Daniel's shoulder, needing to reassure both him and herself that he was still there. But even as she was moving her hand toward him, she pulled it back and shook her head. She was having a hard time remembering that even though she could see Daniel and hear him, she still couldn't touch him. She swallowed hard and glanced up at the trauma team assembled around Daniel once more, and then she turned to Jack.

"They almost look like knife wounds, sir. They're slashes—deep ones."

Jack's eyes widened and he looked down at Daniel in a near-panic. "What's causing them? Have they got the bleeding under control? Is Belos here?"

"The wounds are bloodless," Teal'c said from behind him. Jack looked up to see the Jaffa standing over him, his eyes never wavering from Daniel's bed. "There is no one present, aside from those you see in this room. We would know if Belos were here. We would be reacting to his presence in the same manner we did before, on the planet."

"Jack," Daniel gasped out. He gripped Jack's jacket tightly in his fingers; his blue eyes shone brightly, wide with panic. "Jack, you have to wake up."

"No way, Daniel. I'm not leaving you like this."

"You have to." Daniel winced suddenly, drawing in a harsh breath. "Oh, God …"

"Daniel!" Jack called out, wrapping his fingers around Daniel's. "I'm here. I'm right here, Daniel. It's okay."

"No," Daniel whispered, opening his eyes slightly and glancing up. "It's not."

"What's happening to you, Daniel?" Sam asked. "Talk to us."

Daniel grimaced in pain. "It's Belos," he barely managed to say.

"Is he here?" Jack demanded.

Daniel shook his head. "No, not here. On the plan … et!" Daniel's voice hitched in the middle of the word, and his back arched up off the floor with it.

"Daniel!" Jack grabbed Daniel by the arms and tried to restrain him, but by this time, Daniel was shaking so violently that Jack knew he'd not be able to hold him down for long. Jack wrapped his arms around Daniel's chest, holding him through the waves of agony that were coursing through him. All the while he kept hoping that the physical contact was comforting, felt more normal to Daniel than it did to him, and wasn't making the pain worse.

He wanted Daniel to know that he wasn't alone.

"Oh, God!" Daniel moaned. "What have I done?"

"We don't understand, Daniel," Sam said softly, after trading expressions of fear and desperation with both Jack and Teal'c. "How is Belos doing this?"

Daniel screwed his eyes shut tightly and clenched his teeth. He gasped in several short, ragged breaths, opened his eyes, and was finally able to force out a few words through the haze in his mind. "I told you … he's got … the rest of me …" Daniel panted heavily, on the verge of hyperventilation, and shook his head in vehement denial. "I shouldn't … shouldn't feel this … He's not … I'm not … not me … another… the twelfth …"

Daniel's words trailed off and his body went limp in Jack's arms. The deeply pained breaths did not stop.

"Daniel?" Jack lay Daniel on the floor gently and leaned down over him, looking for some sort of response. Daniel's eyes were open, but he stared straight ahead, seeing nothing. "Daniel!"

"I think his … ," Sam began. Jack jerked his face up toward her, the look in his eyes demanding an explanation. "The pain, sir, it must have been too much. I think his mind must have shut down."

"But his eyes are open, Carter," Jack said. "He's still awake."

Sam shook her head sadly. "Yes, sir. He seems to be. And he's still breathing really hard, so his body must still be feeling the pain. His mind's just not letting him know about it any more."

"So, what? He's catatonic now?"

Sam nodded sadly.

"Well, that's just peachy!" Jack growled.

Janet suddenly appeared directly in front of Sam, filling Jack's vision. "Colonel," she said, though from the way she looked around, it was clear to Jack that she had no idea where he was. "Daniel's wounds aren't bleeding, sir, but we've bandaged them to minimize blood loss, in case they should start. Now, sir, I know that you were going to do this yourself, but since you haven't, I'm guessing that you're having some trouble."

Janet held up a syringe that she'd been holding since she had first stepped in front of him. "Colonel, this is a stimulant that will reverse the effects of the sedative Dr. MacKenzie gave you. You should be awake in less than a minute, so if there's anything you need to do to prepare …"

"No!" Jack said quickly, reaching out one hand in the doctor's direction. "Teal'c, stop her!"

"Dr. Fraiser, O'Neill has asked me to stop you."

"What? Why?"

"I have to stay unconscious, Ja … damn, she can't hear me. Teal'c, just tell her that I have to stay where I am. I don't want her to wake me up."

"If we are to return Daniel Jackson to the planet, O'Neill, you will require consciousness. It will be far too dangerous for you to venture there in your current state."

"Teal'c's right, sir," Sam said. "It's bad enough that we have to risk taking Daniel back there like this. If you're separated as well, we'll be doubling Belos' chances of succeeding."

"Look at him!" Jack gestured at the limp body on the floor in front of him. "He won't be able to make it alone; he can't even stand up! I'll have to carry him through, and the only way I can do that is by staying where I am."

Janet was watching Teal'c's and Sam's faces anxiously, obviously hoping for any hint at the other side of the conversation she was listening to. Sam had turned away from her, and finding Teal'c's face, as always, unreadable, she asked him, "Teal'c, what did he say?"

"O'Neill says that he must remain in his current state in order to carry Daniel Jackson through the Stargate."

"Carry him? Why?" Janet asked in confusion. "I thought he was ambulatory."

Teal'c's eyes narrowed, but his voice remained steady. "Daniel Jackson's present condition prevents him from walking."

"What is his current condition?" Janet asked, hating the fact that she couldn't see Daniel for herself.

"His consciousness appears to be feeling the injuries that are appearing on his body. He has not spoken in several minutes, and does appear unable to move."

"Is he bleeding?"

"No," Jack answered, forgetting that Janet couldn't hear him. "A consciousness can't bleed."

"He is not," Teal'c repeated.

"Has he passed out?"

"He can't!" Jack responded forcefully. "He's awake, and he's feeling every God damned thing that snake is doing to him!"

"He cannot lose consciousness," Teal'c told Janet softly.

"Oh, my God," Sam gasped, covering her mouth with her hand. Janet turned toward her and found her pale and trembling.

"Captain?"

"The other part of him … it's his soul," she whispered. "Belos is torturing his soul."


	16. Chapter 16

- - -

Chapter Sixteen

- - -

Once it had become obvious to everyone that Daniel didn't have fifteen minutes to waste, the medical team gathered around Daniel's and Jack's beds to prepare them for the return trip through the stargate.

Preparing Jack was relatively simple. His body was still breathing on its own, which Janet attributed to the fact that he had left his willingly, whereas Daniel had been given no choice in the matter. Because of that, he required nothing more than a simple ride on a gurney to the gate room. Preparing Daniel was a bit trickier though, and Janet had chosen that time to send Teal'c and Sam from the isolation room to get themselves ready for the mission.

The first step in moving Daniel was the least difficult—transferring his life support from the heavy infirmary machines to the smaller, portable units that could go through the gate with him. Even though they were portable, those machines would warrant a stretcher of their own, and the two airmen who would be carrying it would have to be extra careful to match the pace of the ones carrying Daniel's body. If the two groups got too far apart and the ET tube or pacemaker became dislodged … Janet shook her head. She'd picked the best people in the mountain for this mission; there could be no careless mistakes made, not with Daniel's life hanging in the balance.

The second step was one that occurred to Janet almost as an afterthought. Daniel would be going through to 759 as a dead body, and would feel nothing. If they were successful however, and Janet had to believe they would be, he would be returning as a living, breathing person again, and wormholes were cold. Realizing that it would be easier to dress him in the comfort and security of the base than in a temple on a distant planet, she instructed her nurses to remove his ripped hospital gown and replace it with a pair of fatigue pants, socks, and combat boots. His shirt and jacket would go through with them, but would remain off until Janet determined that the deep gashes on his chest weren't going to cause him any serious problems.

The third, and most difficult, step in preparing Daniel's body was planning for the secondary injuries that would almost inevitably accompany his return to his body. The most obvious potential complication were the gashes that had appeared on his chest and face. They hadn't bled at all, which had confused Janet, to say the least. But she had a suspicion that the second his consciousness returned to his body, they would start—and they had the potential to be fatal. She had measured the deepest of the wounds, a long diagonal gash that ran from his left shoulder to his right hip, and at its worst, it was over an inch deep.

On top of the gashes, the two bullet wounds from the day before were still there and could present her with any number of difficulties, even though they had been treated. The least life-threatening injuries, but by no means not worrisome, were the ones that had resulted from the colonel's CPR. Daniel had three broken ribs and a hairline fracture in his sternum. Whether Jack had broken them initially or she herself had broken them later, she had no way of knowing, but there was no denying that they would be immensely painful. They would impede any attempts he made to breathe on his own.

Janet wished, not for the first time, that she had more tangible facts—to say nothing of a tangible patient—to build her treatment plan around. But at this point, she knew it was wasted energy. The events of the past two days being what they were, the best she could hope for was that one or two of the theories she was clinging to would turn out to be right.

"All right," she finally said to her assembled staff. "Let's get him transferred to the stretcher now. I want to be in the gate room in three minutes."

Jack had moved Daniel away from the beds and into the corner of the room after a second trauma nurse had walked through them. He stood protectively over Daniel, watching Janet's preparations with a keen interest and a growing sense of dread. Daniel's open eyes were still unseeing, and he hadn't spoken since his perplexing words earlier. And just what, exactly, was "I'm not me" supposed to mean? He'd said there was another—another what? The twelfth what?

Jack sighed as he knelt on his left knee at Daniel's side. He rested his elbows on his bent right leg and leaned forward. "Ya know, Daniel," he began softly, "you're gonna have to wake up pretty soon here. We're going back—Doc says we'll be ready to go in about three minutes. You don't want to sleep through the party, do you? What with you being the guest of honor and all …"

Sam and Teal'c entered the room at a jog; each of them carried one backpack strapped to their back, and another held over their shoulder.

"Extra packs, Captain?" Jack asked.

"Yours and Daniel's, sir," Sam answered without hesitation. "We just thought that …"

"You will not always be as you are now," Teal'c said. "Once you and Daniel Jackson have regained possession of your physical bodies, you will require your equipment."

Jack smiled at the implications of such a seemingly simple gesture. Teal'c and Sam had brought his and Daniel's packs, thought that they would need them when the mission was over, believed that they could win.

No, his team _knew_ that they would win.

Jack's smile widened and he nodded in agreement. "Damn right we will."

"Colonel O'Neill," Janet interrupted from across the room. "Now that Captain Carter and Teal'c are here, we're ready to go whenever you are, sir."

Jack looked from Sam to Teal'c before turning his attention to Daniel. "Okay, big guy," he said as he knelt down and grabbed Daniel's arms. "Let's get this over with."

Less than a minute later, after Janet and her medical team had exited the isolation room with both Daniel's and Jack's bodies on their gurneys, Jack stood slowly, with Daniel draped across his shoulders. He allowed himself a few seconds to adjust to the additional weight, and then let out an exaggerated sigh.

"Even non-corporeal, he's still heavier than he looks."

"They're waiting for us, sir," Sam said softly.

Jack nodded, but none of them moved toward the door.

They knew it was a huge risk, taking Daniel's body back to 759. It was the last place in the universe that they should have been going, and they knew it. They were taking a chance that Belos might be able to steal a body—and they were taking two of them with them, not just one—and escape from the planet that had been his prison for more than four thousand years. But as dangerous as it was, not just for them but for the galaxy, it was the only chance they had to get Daniel back.

Jack knew, as they all did, that it was a risk they had to take.

He nodded again, shifted Daniel's weight slightly across his shoulders, and started toward the door.

"Come on, kids," he said as he exited into the corridor. "Back over the rainbow we go."

- - -

The atmosphere in the gate room was one of barely controlled chaos. Jack's and Daniel's bodies rested on gurneys at the foot of the ramp. The medical team hovered around them, checking the wires and tubes connected to Daniel and making certain that the colonel was still breathing.

Jack led the rest of SG-1 through the doors and into the room, shaking his head when he caught a glimpse of himself by the gate.

"Is it a bad sign that I'm getting used to this?" he asked.

"Used to what, sir?" Sam said.

"This," Jack answered, jerking his chin toward his gurney. "Standing here, looking at my body over there."

Sam smiled. "Don't worry, sir," she said. "It'll all be over soon."

"Not soon enough, if ya ask me," Jack muttered.

Teal'c looked around at the assembled team with a critical eye. He raised one eyebrow and looked around again. "I am displeased with the personnel chosen for this mission," he announced.

Sam glanced over at Janet, who looked more than slightly insulted, then turned to Teal'c and said, "Teal'c, there are no better medical personnel on this base."

"Of this I have no doubt, Captain Carter," Teal'c returned. "However, they are medical personnel, and there are only five of them. Two will be required to carry O'Neill. You and I will carry Daniel Jackson. And two others will be required to carry Daniel Jackson's support machines." Teal'c looked around the room once more and then directly at Jack. "Are we to go with no protection?"

"That's what we're here for, Teal'c," a familiar voice answered from behind him.

Jack turned his head and smiled. Lou Ferretti and SG-2 stood in the gate room door, and directly behind them were Robert Makepeace and SG-3.

It had been Ferretti's voice they had heard, and he was smiling at them. "General Hammond said he needed volunteers for a rather … unique search and rescue," he said. He moved into the room and motioned for his men to follow.

"Hope you don't mind," Makepeace said with a smile as he led his team to the foot of the ramp. "Guess the flyboy got you guys in over your heads this time, huh? Figured we could help you out."

Jack gritted his teeth. "Arrogant jarhead," he murmured.

Sam plastered a smile on her face and turned to Makepeace. "The colonel is thrilled," she lied.

Teal'c raised his eyebrow again.

Makepeace laughed. "Yeah, I bet he is."

The distinctive sound of the gate spinning into position echoed through the room, and everyone turned to face it.

"SG-1, SG-2, SG-3, and special medical team, you have a go for P2A-759." Hammond's voice floated through the speakers from the control room above. The gate continued spinning as the chevrons locked into place, one by one. "Your mission—search and rescue for Dr. Daniel Jackson. Bring him home." There was a slight pause, as though Hammond were considering whether or not to continue. He made his decision quickly.

"In one piece this time, if you please."

Jack smiled in spite of himself and nodded. "Will do, sir," he said even though he knew Hammond couldn't hear him.

Sam and Teal'c placed the extra packs they carried on the stretchers that bore their owners, and then took positions at either end of Daniel's gurney. Ferretti motioned for two members of SG-2 to take up similar positions around Jack, and two members of SG-3 lifted the stretcher containing the life support machines.

The unstable vortex of the forming wormhole exploded into the room. Jack tightened his grip on Daniel and started up the ramp, anxious to get Daniel fixed and back home, safe, alive, and in one piece again. Just before he stepped through the stargate, he heard Hammond's voice behind him, one last time.

"Good luck and Godspeed."

- - -

The second Jack exited the wormhole on P2A-759, he knew that something about Daniel had changed. His feeling was confirmed when, a few seconds later, he heard a soft, "Jack?"

"Just a sec," he answered. He made his way down the steps quickly as the rest of the procession exited the gate behind him. When he reached the bottom of the stairs he knelt down and slid Daniel to the ground.

"Hey," Jack said brightly. "You're back!"

"What, I went somewhere?" Daniel's words were meant in jest, Jack knew, but the weakness in his voice kept his joke from being funny.

"Colonel?"

Jack looked up to see Sam and Teal'c, and the rest of the rescue team, standing beside him.

"We should go, sir," Sam said softly. She looked down at Daniel and gave him a quick smile. "It's going to be dark soon."

Jack nodded and turned back to Daniel. "Okay, buddy, up you go." He reached for Daniel's arms, to pull him back across his shoulders, but Daniel pulled against him.

"Jack, I … I'm getting stronger. I think I can probably walk now."

Jack gave him a look of pure skepticism. "Daniel, two minutes ago you were catatonic. Now you can walk by yourself?"

Daniel shrugged and flashed a slight grin. "I didn't say by myself. If you could help … ?"

Jack sighed, an exaggerated, long-suffering sigh. "Oh, all right." He wrapped his hand around the inside of Daniel's forearm and pulled him to his feet. A few seconds later they stood, side by side, with Daniel's arm across Jack's shoulders, and Jack's arm around Daniel's lower back.

"Carter!" Jack called out. "Tell Makepeace to leave three men to guard the gate and set the C4. We're not taking any chances with this."

Sam nodded and turned toward Makepeace. "Colonel Makepeace, Colonel O'Neill says to …"

"He doesn't think I'm going to take orders from him while he's unconscious, does he?" Makepeace interrupted. "I don't care if you're the ranking officer, Jack," he added, with a glance back toward the gate and Jack's general location. "I don't have to take orders from you if I can't see you, which means I'm in charge."

"Damn it, Makepeace!" Jack growled.

"Jack," Daniel said quietly. "Can we just go? Please?"

Jack was about to say more but the look of exhaustion in Daniel's eyes, combined with the fact that Makepeace did order three men to stay at the gate and lay C4, diffused his anger. He turned toward the rest of the rescue party to find that they had already started moving away toward the temple.

Jack tightened his grip on Daniel's wrist. "You ready for this?"

Daniel nodded silently.

"No witty comeback? No sarcastic reply?"

"Jack, can we please just go?"

Jack nodded curtly and stepped away from the dais, pretending not to notice that he was bearing most of Daniel's weight.

"Sure," he answered with as much levity as he could muster. "Let's just go."

- - -

The trip from the stargate to the temple took less time than it had the day before, despite the necessity of carrying two people on stretchers and the fact that one of them was connected to every type of portable medical machinery known to man.

Teal'c and Sam carried Daniel's body between them, and Jack half-carried/half-dragged the rest of him. When they passed the two black obelisks that Daniel had been so fascinated by less than thirty-six hours earlier, Daniel began to support more of his own weight. By the time they began climbing the ramp between the entry pylons at the temple, Jack's arm around Daniel's waist was for moral support rather than physical.

"Well," Jack remarked as they passed between the massive columns in the outer hall, "you're feeling better."

Daniel nodded. "I'm drawing strength from the others now. I spent so much time with Aynad when I was here before that I didn't realize how much I needed the rest of them."

Jack noticed that Daniel was staring at something ahead of them, and he turned to see what. It was the inscription above the door to the sanctuary—the one in Latin that had seemed so out of place, that neither of them had understood. Daniel was looking at it, but his eyes were distant, as though his thoughts were a million miles away.

"I really needed him," Daniel whispered.

Jack heard the pain of loss in Daniel's voice, and knew that he was talking about Aynad, the man from his dream. Jack remembered that Daniel had mentioned something about him having been killed earlier in the day, though he still had no idea how Daniel could possibly know that. Jack wanted to say something to distract him from his thoughts, and glanced back up at the inscription again. He looked at it, and repeated in his head what Daniel had translated for him the day before.

"Hey!" he said suddenly. "That's us!"

Daniel simply smiled at him.

Sam and Teal'c, carrying Daniel's stretcher, stopped and looked up at the inscription for themselves—neither of them had noticed it before.

"Sir?" Sam asked.

"It's us, Carter. Look: 'From four bodies'—that's us—'comes one mind'—that's that thing we did yesterday, the reading each other's minds thing. 'From one mind'—us again—'come three spirits' …" Jack paused for a second and wrinkled his forehead. "Okay, then, maybe it's not us. All four of our spirits made it back out, it's just that Daniel's wasn't where it belonged."

Sam and Teal'c stared at Jack in open astonishment. "You read Latin, sir?" Sam asked.

"What? No, Daniel told me what it says yesterday, didn't you, Daniel?"

Daniel was still staring up at the inscription with a wistful smile on his face.

"No, Jack," he said softly. "It's right—only three spirits left here."

Jack looked confused. "But you're …"

"Here for a reason, Jack." Daniel pulled himself away from Jack and stood under his own power. "Let's get this over with."

Daniel led the way into the sanctuary, followed immediately by Jack, and Sam and Teal'c. Janet followed them, along with the two Marines who carried the life support machines. Behind them, two members of SG-2 carried Jack's body. The rest of SG-2 and all of SG-3, including Makepeace and Ferretti, followed along behind.

Janet oversaw the settling of the men's bodies in the corner of the room furthest from the overturned altar. Sam and Teal'c had already warned everyone that the beam that had imprisoned the four members of SG-1 the day before had emanated from a glyph located directly behind that altar. No one knew if any of the other glyphs could act similarly, but it seemed prudent to avoid that one as much as possible.

Jack turned to Daniel, noticing that the other man seemed to have regained all of his strength. "Okay, Daniel. We're here. Read the walls and figure out how to get back in yourself so we can get the hell out of here."

"Tell Makepeace and Ferretti to have their men set charges on the wall around the glyph, Jack," Daniel said.

"What?" Jack asked in surprise. "You want to blow up the walls of a temple?"

Daniel shook his head. "No, Jack, I want to stop Belos, once and for all. Once you're back where you belong and Da … and the consciousness is back in my body, we need to destroy that glyph. It's his … his interface, with the physical world. Without it, he's stuck where he is. And he'll never be able to do this to anyone else, ever again."

Jack narrowed his eyes and tilted his head. "You don't sound very unsure any more, Daniel," he said.

Daniel shook his head slowly. "I'm not, Jack. I know what I have to do. I've known all along."

Daniel turned to walk back out of the sanctuary. Jack stepped forward and grabbed his arm. "Hey! Where do you think you're going?"

"There's only one way to end this, Jack," Daniel said with a smile that was both serene and knowing.

"Really?" Jack asked. "And what is that?"

"I have to face Belos."


	17. Chapter 17

- - -

Chapter Seventeen

- - -

"What?!" three voices asked in unison.

"Daniel Jackson, you cannot mean to …"

"Daniel, you can't! It's too dangerous …"

"If you think I'm going to let you do that alone, you're nuts!"

Daniel stopped in the door and turned back to face his teammates. "What are you going to do, Jack? What could you possibly do against him?"

"Well, what can you do against him? Look, I'm going with you," Jack said firmly. "And that's final. Now you wait for me, right there." He turned back to Sam and Teal'c. "Okay, you heard what he said about the glyph. Tell Ferretti first, have him tell Makepeace. And if he gives you any crap about not taking orders from me because I'm unconscious …"

"Yes, sir," Sam said quickly. "We'll make sure it gets done."

"Okay, good."

"What of us?" Teal'c asked. "Should we not accompany you and Daniel Jackson to confront Belos?"

Jack shook his head quickly. "No. I want you two to stay here."

"But, sir," Sam interjected. "It's entirely possible, because of the beam, that Teal'c and I can leave our bodies too, just like you and Daniel. If what Daniel said is true, then the beam's primary function is loosening the connection between a body and its consciousness. Colonel, we can help."

"Absolutely not!" Jack snapped back. "Look, it's bad enough that he's got two bodies just laying here waiting for him to jump into them; we're not giving him four. Now, I'm ordering you two to stay here, in your bodies. Is that clear?"

Sam nodded. "Perfectly, sir."

"Indeed."

Jack nodded. "All right, then. We'll be back." He turned to follow Daniel out of the sanctuary.

"Colonel …"

"We'll be back, Captain," Jack repeated without turning around. "Just be ready for us."

Jack reached Daniel's side, and together they walked back out into the large outer hall. Sam and Teal'c stared after them until they disappeared from sight, behind two of the massive stone columns. Sam sighed and turned to Teal'c.

"I guess it's time to get everyone ready."

Teal'c nodded without speaking.

Sam took one step forward, then stopped and turned back to Teal'c again. She was frowning, and Teal'c saw that she was chewing on her lower lip, as if in thought. "Teal'c, do you feel like … well, do you feel like maybe we shouldn't have let them leave without us?"

Teal'c nodded again. "Indeed I do, Captain Carter. It was Daniel Jackson himself who was most insistent that we remain together. It seems strange to me that he would want us to remain behind now."

Sam shrugged and started walking slowly back toward the others. "I don't know, Teal'c. He seems like he knows what he's doing."

"He appears to have learned much from the short time he spent dreaming of the one called Aynad," Teal'c observed.

"You noticed that too, huh?" Sam asked. "I mean, at first he didn't seem to know anything more than the rest of us did, and then all of a sudden, it was like he knew everything. He knows how Belos got here, what he was doing here, how long he's been here …" Sam stopped dead in her tracks and turned back around quickly. "Teal'c, how could he learn all of that so quickly?"

Teal'c simply looked back at her. "I am uncertain about a great many things, Captain Carter. However, there is one … feeling … that has concerned me more than any other."

"What's that?"

"When first we watched Daniel Jackson's body die, I felt as if a great void had formed inside of me. I believe it now to be the part of my mind that was tied to Daniel's Jackson's by the beam responding to his sudden absence."

Sam nodded. "I know. I felt it too. And I think you're right; I think that's exactly what it was."

"Did this feeling of emptiness leave you, Captain Carter, when you learned of the continued existence of Daniel Jackson's consciousness?"

Sam concentrated for a moment, and then shook her head. "No. No, it didn't. It's still there."

"If Daniel Jackson were truly with us at the SGC, would not the connections in our minds have recognized this fact and reacted to his presence?"

"They should have," Sam said slowly. "Unless …"

"Yes, Captain Carter?"

"Unless … what if …," Sam struggled to find the right words. "What if the Daniel Jackson we took back with us wasn't the same one that got caught in the beam with us?" Sam's voice was barely above a whisper, so soft that Teal'c had to lean forward to hear her.

"Is this possible?"

"Oh, I think it is, Teal'c," Sam said. "And I think after we inform Major Ferretti of the colonel's orders, we need to speak with Dr. Fraiser. ASAP."

- - -

Jack's mind was running a million miles a minute as he and Daniel walked between two of the columns and through a smaller door, leaving the outer hall behind them. He didn't have a clue where they were going, because Daniel hadn't bothered to tell him and he hadn't bothered to ask. But Daniel seemed to know where he was going, and that was what mattered. Jack was determined to stay on his heels every step of the way, wherever they might end up. After all, if Daniel had his mind set on a duel of some sort with a non-corporeal Goa'uld, he'd need someone to protect him.

Jack looked up at the man walking beside him and suddenly realized that Daniel didn't look like he needed protecting. It was almost impossible for Jack to reconcile the Daniel that walked beside him now with the Daniel that had been shaking in his arms on the isolation room floor less than an hour before. This Daniel had hard eyes and a grim determination on his face. That Daniel had been almost delirious from pain, had claimed that he wasn't really himself, that there was another …

Jack's mind turned over and another piece of the puzzle feel into place. The Daniel Jackson he knew would never suggest destroying a temple without so much as a hint of regret in his voice. The Daniel Jackson he knew hated the Goa'uld, there was no doubt about that, but he would never volunteer to take one on, face-to-face, alone. The Daniel Jackson he knew exuded an air of friendliness and peace, not anger and …

Power.

The Daniel Jackson walking between the columns with Jack fairly bristled with it—a raw power, fueled by anger and hatred, which Jack had never felt before. And when Jack looked, really truly looked, at the man beside him, he saw something that he had never seen before.

"Daniel?" he said quietly. "You're um … you're glowing …"

"What?" Daniel sounded distracted, but when he looked down at himself, he saw what Jack was talking about. "Oh! Um … sorry …"

Jack stared in awe at the powerful Daniel Jackson that stood beside him now. And as he watched the tendrils of light that snaked their way around his legs, and the lightning dancing around the younger man's fingertips, he understood.

"You're not him, are you?"

Daniel smiled softly. "I am Daniel Jackson. I'm just not the one you know."

"How long have you been like this?"

"It's hard to say, really. There's no real way to measure time where I am."

Jack remembered Daniel's muttered words from the infirmary, and he ventured a guess. "And you're the twelfth Daniel Jackson to go through this?"

Daniel shook his head slowly. "No, I'm the eleventh. He's the twelfth."

Jack's eyes darted around the long corridor they were walking down and he stepped forward in sudden concern.

"Where is he?" he demanded. "Where's my Daniel?"

"He's alive," Daniel answered. "He's here. We're on our way to him right now."

Another realization dawned, and everything that had confused him over the past two days suddenly made almost perfect sense to him. "What you said back at the base, about not being able to get back in your—his –body … that wasn't true, was it? It wasn't that you had to come back here to get back in, or that you had to read the walls, or that parts of you were missing. You can't go into that body at all because it's not yours!"

Daniel simply nodded.

"So it was all lies? Designed to convince us to bring Daniel's body back here with us?"

"Yes."

Jack erupted in anger. "Damn it, Daniel, why didn't you tell me?"

Daniel sighed. "Think about it, Jack. Think back over every word I said, over every conversation we've had. I never actually told you that I was your Daniel Jackson."

"Okay, maybe not," Jack admitted after a few seconds of thought. "But I had absolutely no idea there was more than one. Of course I never asked you, but you sure as hell never told me that you weren't!"

"Semantics, Jack. I told you what you needed to hear to get you to come back here with his body. That's all that matters. Saving Daniel is what matters."

"You don't need to tell me that," Jack growled. He let out a deep breath and shook his head. "You could have told me more, Daniel. You could have told me the truth."

Daniel shook his head sadly. "It wouldn't have worked, Jack. Look, I know you. I had a Jack O'Neill of my own, after all." Daniel's smile was filled with sadness, but it was only there for a second, and then he had pushed it away. "You were so ready to think that you'd gone insane rather than let yourself believe that I just might be real … What if my 'ghost' had appeared and said, 'Hey, Jack, there are two Daniels now. Yours is trapped on 759, and I'm a different one—one from three weeks in the future. Oh, by the way, it's a future where the three of you are dead and Belos killed you with my hands after he took over my body, but that's not important right now. Anyway, let's go back to the planet now … ' What would you have thought? What would you have done?"

Jack considered Daniel's words for only a moment before nodding. "I'd have called MacKenzie myself."

"And your Daniel would have been trapped here forever, with no chance to fix anything, because instead of staying with him and teaching him what to do, I went to the SGC with you to try and save him." Daniel shrugged and tried not to look upset, but to Jack, the gesture only made the fact that he was upset that much more obvious. "I was so sure that I could do it on my own, that I could stop it all right here, right now, forever. It was arrogant and foolish, and I almost got him killed. I did get Aynad killed …"

"Daniel, slow down!" Jack interrupted. "Remember that I'm just finding all this out for the first time, okay? How were you doing this? How did you get this Aynad person killed?"

Daniel let his head fall toward his chest, and he sighed deeply. "The first time SG-1 came here, the first Daniel Jackson that lost his body to Belos … after it was over, after Belos had killed the rest of you and left for Earth, Daniel begged Aynad to help him. He knew that Aynad had the same abilities that Belos had, and he hoped that it included the ability to warp time. He was right. So he explained to Aynad that he thought that if he could just go back in time, just a few days, and warn himself, that he'd be able to stop it from happening again."

"And it didn't work," Jack said.

"No, it didn't work. So it happened again. The first Daniel ceased to exist and the second took his place. Two weeks later, Aynad took the second Daniel back in time with him, and they tried again. Aynad taught us things, how to use some of the power that we gained in this form, and we kept trying. Again, and again, and again…"

"Until the eleventh," Jack interjected.

Daniel nodded. "Until the eleventh. Until me. Until I let a promise that I made interfere with my ability to do what needed to be done."

"What promise?" Jack asked.

"I made a promise, Jack," Daniel answered softly. He lifted his head to look Jack straight in the eye. "To you. I swore to you that I'd never let you die again, that I'd keep Sam and Teal'c alive, and that I'd protect the next Daniel Jackson from Belos, no matter what I had to do. I promised you that I'd save you. I thought I'd figured out a way to do it… You see, the rest of us got caught in the beam alone. But I knew that if you got caught in it with him, that you'd be connected to him, that your consciousnesses would merge, and I thought that Belos wouldn't be able to separate you in time." Daniel sighed again. "I was wrong. So I had Aynad give Daniel the dream, knowing that he'd tell you what he'd seen."

"He sure tried," Jack said sadly. "We didn't listen to him."

"Belos wasn't letting you understand the importance of what he was saying. And if you didn't understand, then you wouldn't act on it."

"Which we didn't."

Daniel nodded again. "I was so desperate to keep my promise to you that I … I made a rash decision. I knew that I couldn't get Daniel away from Belos in time to send him back with you, but I also knew that if someone didn't go with you, to convince you to bring his body back here, then he'd die, and not only would I have failed, I'd have been the Daniel Jackson that killed the next one instead of protecting him. So … I left him here with Aynad, and I went with you. Aynad managed to get him away from Belos, and they hid from him for a while. I was talking to Aynad when Belos found them…" Daniel closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "Belos killed Aynad, and he brought Daniel back here. And he's been here, alone, with no one to protect him, no one to help him…" He opened his eyes and looked directly at Jack once more. "I'm sorry, Jack. I shouldn't have interfered. I should have done what all the others did, ceased to exist, and let him take his chances with the thirteenth."

Jack looked around the corridor for a few seconds, using the time it bought him to absorb everything Daniel had told him. After he had, he nodded his head and turned back to Daniel again. "And if you'd done that, he'd have been stuck here, right? There'd have been no one to tell us what had happened, we wouldn't have come back, and he'd have been trapped, right? Until he just ceased to exist?"

Daniel nodded. "But the next one …"

Jack shook his head quickly. "No. If the alternative to what has happened would have been Daniel trapped here forever and us not knowing that he was still alive, then I'm glad you did it. I wouldn't have wanted you to do anything else."

"But, Jack …"

"Nope. It's exactly like you said," Jack continued. "It's saving Daniel that's important. And because of you, we can." Jack smiled and patted Daniel's arm. That one small gesture, so personal and comfortable, expressed without words everything that Jack was feeling. He wanted to find his Daniel, save him, take him home … and he trusted this Daniel to help him. "So let's go do it."

Daniel smiled, overcome with relief that Jack had accepted his explanation and truly believing, once again, that as long as they did it together, they would win. He realized that he'd made a mistake by allowing Jack to leave Sam and Teal'c behind, and he knew that he'd have to return for them. SG-1 was four people, but more than that, it was the sum total of those four people, and what they meant to each other and what they would do for each other, that made it what it was. Maybe Jack had been right about the inscription—maybe all four souls had made it out of this temple together because, after all … wasn't he Daniel Jackson?

Daniel nodded quickly. "Let's do it."

Jack released Daniel's arm, and together, they turned and continued down the corridor in silence. As they neared the door at the end, Jack felt the void in his chest that he'd been ignoring for more than twenty-four hours starting to fill back up, and he knew without a doubt what—or rather _who_—was waiting for them on the other side. It took every ounce of self-control that Jack possessed to keep himself from running.


	18. Chapter 18

- - -

Chapter Eighteen

- - -

They walked through the door and into the room, with its eerie shadows cast by the torches that illuminated it. It took a few seconds for Jack's eyes to adjust to the change in lighting, but when they did, what he saw made his breath catch in his throat.

He was across the room, standing against the wall, his arms straight out at his sides. His eyes were closed and there was a look of pain etched deeply in his face. He seemed to be held there by something that Jack couldn't see—no one that pale could be standing under his own power. The self-control that Jack had been fighting to maintain evaporated.

"Oh, God," he muttered.

The Daniel beside him saw the look on Jack's face, and knew immediately what the older man was thinking. "Jack, don't!" he warned quietly, but it was too late.

Jack was already running.

"Daniel!" he called out as he crossed the floor toward him. "Daniel!"

He skidded to a halt directly in front of the younger man against the wall, and he knew at once that this was his Daniel Jackson. The void had vanished. If that weren't enough, there were marks on his face, and visible through rips and tears in his shirt, that matched the ones that marred the body lying in the sanctuary.

"Damn it," Jack muttered gently. He reached out and carefully placed his right hand against Daniel's face. "Daniel, can you hear me? Daniel?"

Daniel's eyes fluttered briefly before opening. They darted around the room in wild confusion, glazed and unfocused. He tried to pull away from Jack's touch, and gasped out a terrified, "No!" that made Jack freeze in near horror.

"What did he do to you?" he whispered to himself. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and forced himself to continue.

"Daniel!" he said again, louder and more insistent. He forced himself to ignore Daniel's flinch and continued. "It's me. Daniel, it's Jack. Look at me."

Daniel turned his unfocused gaze toward Jack's voice, a look of desperate hope on his face.

"Jack?"

"Yeah, Daniel," Jack answered. "It's me. I'm here."

Daniel swallowed hard, and Jack could see the effort he was putting into concentrating.

"Real?"

Jack smiled softly. "Yeah, I'm real."

Jack expected happiness, or relief, possibly confusion, maybe even tears. He did not expect Daniel's face to harden or his eyes to turn cold and bitter.

"You left me!"

Jack's stomach jumped into his throat. "Hey, now …"

"I told you," Daniel continued, his voice still weak and shaky but the expression of betrayal clear on his face. "I told you … you wouldn't listen." The words were punctuated by Daniel's ragged gasps for breath and frantic shakes of his head. "But it … it happened, and you left me. I watched you … watched you leave, watched you go home … home, where it was safe. I yelled for you … to help, to stop, but Belos …"

"Daniel, calm down..."

"No! Belos grabbed me, but I … I couldn't get away, and I screamed, and you … you just left!"

"We couldn't see you, Daniel," Jack insisted.

"Couldn't see me? Belos grabbed me … pulled me away … like I told you …" Daniel gasped for breath and tried to lean forward, and Jack saw that his earlier assumption about invisible bonds around his wrists was correct. "I was right there … right in front of you. How could you not see me?"

Jack glanced around the room almost frantically, noticing that the other Daniel had disappeared and hoping that he would make an appearance and help him explain the situation. It was obvious that this Daniel had absolutely no idea what had actually happened to him, and having the other Daniel there as proof would go a long way toward helping him understand, but he was nowhere to be seen. "Damn it, Daniel," he muttered.

Jack drew a deep breath and turned back to face Daniel again. "Look, I don't have very long to explain, because Belos is around here somewhere, and we've got to get you out of here, but you need to know something."

"What?" Daniel croaked.

"You're not quite as … solid … as you think you are."

"What?" Daniel was exhausted, confused and in pain, and he slumped back against the wall, all thought of further protest dying before it reached his lips.

"Belos pulled you away, you said. You think he just pulled you off the stretcher?"

Daniel nodded slowly and closed his eyes, squeezing them tightly shut against the remembered pain that Jack saw written so plainly on his face.

"He did a little more than that, Daniel. When he pulled you away, he left your body where it was."

"My … what?" Daniel opened his eyes again and looked directly into Jack's. "My body?"

"See, what to you felt like Belos grabbing you and pulling you away, to us, Daniel … it looked like you were having a heart attack. We thought you were dead."

Confusion began making its way back onto Daniel's face, replacing some of the anger and betrayal. "Wait, I … I don't …"

Jack glanced around once more. The back of his neck was beginning to prickle at him, and he knew he was running out of time.

"Okay, here." Jack reached back out and grabbed Daniel's face between his hands. Daniel flinched almost immediately. "You feel that?"

"Yes," Daniel answered, his voice once again shaky and fearful. Jack realized immediately that he'd misinterpreted Daniel's recoil from his touch; Daniel hadn't been pulling back from him. He'd been flinching from a memory, a sense memory—Belos had been the only one who'd touched him since he'd been removed from his body. Daniel had thought Jack was Belos.

"What does it feel like to you?"

"Weird," Daniel answered slowly. "Kind of …"

"Muted, like? Sluggish? Like it feels when you touch something …"

"… in a dream," Daniel finished. "It feels like I'm dreaming, like it's not real." Daniel closed his eyes and shuddered. "That's what it felt like when Belos touched me too."

Jack had to smile, albeit only briefly, that he'd been right. "That's because he's no more corporeal than we are, Daniel. He's exactly like us. He doesn't have a body either."

Daniel's eyes flew open. "You don't have … He got you too!"

"No!" Jack denied. "No, he didn't get me. I left mine on purpose, to come get you."

"You can do that?"

Jack shrugged. "Well, I can right now. I don't know how much longer it's going to last, but …"

Jack turned away quickly, both seeing and feeling the dark shadow that had appeared in the corridor and was making its way slowly in their direction. "Oh, crap."

He spun back toward Daniel. "We're outta time here, buddy," he said. "Tell me how to get you off this wall, because we have got to get out of here."

Daniel looked from one wrist to the other quickly, Jack's obvious urgency having pushed most of his disorientation, and most of his questions, to the back of his mind. "I … I don't know. I never saw … I don't see anything."

"Okay," Jack said. "Okay, we'll figure it out somehow. We've just got to …" He looked back over his shoulder again. The shadow was still moving toward them, even more slowly than before, almost as if it were enjoying the desperation taking place in front of it.

"Damn you, not yet!" Jack yelled at the shadow. "You can't have him!"

Daniel's eyes widened when he saw the shadow looming in the hallway over Jack's shoulder. "He's here," he whispered fearfully. He shrank back as far against the wall as he could. "Belos is here!"

"Daniel, I kinda need you here. Don't freak out on me."

"No!" Daniel came to life, struggling futilely against his invisible bonds. "Leave him alone! I

won't let you do this!"

The shadow laughed, and Jack spun back toward it just in time to see the two glowing circles where the thing's eyes would have been. "Oh, great," he muttered. "That's just what I needed to see right now."

"Jack!" Daniel's voice wasn't as frantic as it had been before, but it was insistent.

"What?"

"What?" Daniel asked, confusion and fear again evident in his voice. "I didn't … that wasn't … Jack, what's going on?"

Jack smiled and looked toward the ceiling. "There you are!" he said. "It's about time you decided to show back up."

"I had something to take care of," Daniel's voice answered.

"Jack?" Daniel asked softly. "What … who is that?"

Jack shrugged. "Well, Daniel, that's you. He's just not your you." Jack shook his head at the statement, and seeing no greater understanding on Daniel's face, decided not to push it any further. "He'll explain it. Daniel, can you get him free?"

"You cannot defeat me!" the shadow suddenly bellowed. "You pitiful, insignificant child! How dare you defy your god!"

"You're not a god!" Daniel's voice boomed back. "You're nothing but a Goddamned snake!"

Jack and Daniel both looked up toward the direction the voice seemed to be coming from, surprised to hear any Daniel Jackson speaking so harshly. Jack remembered something the other Daniel had said in the corridor; he'd said that Belos had used his body to kill his SG-1. One more glance at his own Daniel, still shaking in fear and pain, was enough to put any other questions to rest. If anything like what had happened to his Daniel had happened to the other one, then Belos deserved the hatred.

"You cannot hope to defeat me, child."

The air between Jack and Daniel shimmered slightly and then was split by a bright, blinding flash of light. Jack blinked it away and wasn't surprised to see the other Daniel Jackson standing there, fatigues replaced by simple robes, anger and determination on his face.

"Try me."

Belos roared in anger once more, and then the shadow disappeared through the wall.

Daniel blinked in astonishment at what stood in front of him—another Daniel Jackson, standing tall and defiant in the face of Belos' anger, repeating the words that he himself had spoken in his dream of the future.

"My dream," he whispered. "This is my dream or … or my nightmare."

"Funny you should say that …" Jack began.

"O'Neill!"

"Colonel!"

Sam's and Teal'c's voices echoed down the corridor and into the room. Jack rolled his eyes and sighed angrily. "I told them to stay put!"

"Yes," Daniel said with a smile. "But I told them not to."

"Why did you do that?" Jack demanded.

"You need back-up."

"I thought you were my back-up!"

"No," Daniel said with a crooked grin. "You were mine, remember? Besides, Teal'c was meditating when I got there, and Sam had already had Dr. Fraiser sedate her. They were coming anyway."

"Isn't anybody following my orders today?" Jack grumbled.

"No," Daniel answered simply.

Sam and Teal'c burst into the room. They both noticed the three men across the room immediately—Jack and Daniel and …

"Daniel?" Sam asked. "Sir?"

"No time to explain, Carter," Jack answered with a quick wave of his hand as he crossed the room toward them. "Bottom line—the one stuck to the wall is ours. We've got to figure out a way to get him out of here." He looked around the area where the shadow had been, tracing the path it had followed out of the room with his eyes. "Where'd he go, Daniel?"

"Sam and Teal'c surprised him; he's regrouping. He'll be back soon," Daniel answered. "You need to be ready when."

"Ready for what?" Sam asked.

Daniel tilted his head to the side slightly. "For all hell to break loose," he answered before turning away from them and toward the other Daniel.

"O'Neill, what is our objective?"

Jack sighed. "I'm not really sure. I think Daniel wants us to keep Belos busy so him and … Daniel … okay, this is so not going to work. I'm going to confuse myself." He shook his head and continued. "I think the other Daniel wants us to keep Belos busy if he comes back. He's going to get our Daniel loose, and then I think they're going to do … something."

"What are they going to do?" Sam asked.

"How are we to keep Belos' attention diverted?" Teal'c asked at the same time.

"I don't know, and, um … we'll make it up as we go."

"Is that a real plan, sir?"

"No, Carter, it's not," Jack answered with a shrug. "But it's going to have to do, because it's all we've got."


	19. Chapter 19

- - -

Chapter Nineteen

- - -

Daniel looked at himself, through eyes narrowed in pain and suspicion. He'd have felt better if Jack had stayed beside him rather than going to talk with Sam and Teal'c. Actually, he'd have felt even better if all three of them were standing closer to him. He didn't want to seem weak and helpless by asking them to, but he could admit it to himself. He still didn't understand what was going on; he'd thought he'd simply been Belos' prisoner and Jack had come back to rescue him. Being told that only his consciousness had been captured, that his body was dead, that Jack—and apparently Sam and Teal'c—could leave their bodies at will, and that this person he was looking at—this person with his face and his voice that wasn't actually him—was another version of him … it was rapidly becoming too much for his weak and tired mind to process.

"You don't have to be afraid of me," the other him said.

Daniel straightened up as much as he could, which admittedly wasn't much, and stuck his chin out. "I'm not afraid of you."

The other him smiled. "Of course you are. I would be, in your place."

Daniel looked away from the other him, toward his friends, trying to draw as much strength as he could from the fact that they were simply there. "Yeah, well … you're not me."

The other him shook his head. "No, I'm not. But I was."

Daniel refused to answer him and did his best imitation of ignoring him entirely.

The other him sighed. "Look, Daniel, we really don't have time for this, okay? I know there's a lot going on right now, and you don't really understand any of it, but you have got to trust me."

Daniel blinked and turned toward the other him slowly. "The last person who tried to help me … Belos killed him right in front of me," he said softly.

"I know," the other him said with a slow, sad nod. "I felt him die."

Daniel closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the wall again. "I don't want that to happen to them," he said. "I won't let that happen to them."

"Then trust me," the other him said.

Daniel opened his eyes.

"Because that's the only way we're going to be able to prevent it."

- - -

Sam saw the shadow first, moving across the ceiling slowly. "Colonel," she said, looking up.

Jack turned and looked up, too, and his shoulders sagged slightly. "Crap," he muttered. "Oh, Daniel!" he called out. "Time to move!"

The three of them watched as the other Daniel waved his hands across Daniel's arms, and suddenly he was free. Daniel pulled his arms away from the wall, looked down at his hands, and then looked back up at Jack with a weak smile.

Then his eyes rolled back in his head, and he collapsed to the floor.

"Daniel!" Jack yelled.

"No!" Sam cried out.

"Daniel Jackson!"

All three of them started forward, but the other Daniel held up his hand for them to stop. "You worry about Belos!" he called to them. "Let me worry about Daniel!"

"How about you worry about Belos?" Jack yelled back. "This whole thing was your idea, after all!"

"Jack!" the other Daniel shouted in anger.

Jack swallowed his protests when he realized that Belos' shadow had lowered itself to the ground in front of him and had changed shape. Instead of a formless shadow with glowing eyes, they were facing what had once been a Goa'ulded Unas, claws and all.

Jack glanced over his shoulder at Daniel's unmoving form on the floor, and realized there could be no question what exactly had caused those gashes.

"Claw marks," Jack whispered.

"O'Neill?" Teal'c asked.

"Those gashes – they're claw marks. Belos used him for some sort of scratching post." Jack's eyes narrowed in hatred as he turned to face Belos once more.

"Show time," Jack muttered. He looked at Teal'c and Sam, and he jerked his head in Belos' direction.

Teal'c charged forward with a roar and hit Belos straight on; Jack and Sam came at him from the sides. They fought as hard as they could, with everything that had, but it wasn't nearly enough. Belos raised his arms and all three of them flew in opposite directions, slamming into the walls, and found themselves pinned to them just as Daniel had been. The difference was that they were suspended by their invisible restraints three feet above the floor.

Belos snorted indignantly. "Insignificant little humans," he growled, and he started walking toward Daniel.

Jack saw and felt Sam and Teal'c struggling against their invisible bonds, and heard them both calling out Daniel's name in desperation.

Daniel was still lying where he'd fallen, and Belos was stalking toward him unimpeded. The other Daniel was nowhere to be seen—again. Whatever it was that he had planned, Jack somehow doubted that it involved the real Daniel lying on the floor, defenseless against Belos, while the rest of SG-1 hung from the walls, powerless to help him.

Jack drew a deep breath and did the only thing he could think of to postpone what seemed to be inevitable.

"You can't have him!" he cried out, letting his anger, fear, and frustration pour out of him. "He's ours, not yours!"

Belos laughed, the haunting sound echoing against the dull gray stone walls. "And if your god Belos were to humor you, O'Neill, what would you ask of me now? Ask your god, no, beg your god for that which you desire above all else."

"Daniel's life," Jack stated quietly.

"What is this life worth to you, human? Is he worth your pride? I would see you grovel at my feet."

"I don't do groveling," he returned with passion in his voice.

"You will," Belos answered evenly. "Or he will die."

Jack closed his eyes and drew in a ragged breath. "You'll kill him anyway," he finally whispered without opening his eyes again. "You'll kill him, and then you'll kill me, and then you'll kill them. And then you'll steal one of our bodies and kill everyone else, and there's nothing we can do to stop you." Jack looked at the alien in front of him, his eyes hard and cold and filled with hatred. "But if you want to see me beg, snakehead, you're going to be waiting a real long time."

"I can wait, O'Neill." Belos stopped his forward progression, but never took his eyes from Daniel's still form. "Four thousand years I have waited for this one to arrive. Four thousand years I have been trapped here, with only that pitiful Aynad for company. You know nothing of my patience, O'Neill." Belos turned away from Daniel to narrow his eyes at Jack. "If I wish to wait another four thousand years, I will do so. But I see no reason to wait." He turned back to Daniel again. "Not when the one I have waited all this time for is waiting right there—for me."

Jack saw something from Daniel, just a hint of movement, but enough to give him hope. What he was hoping for, he didn't know. He, Sam and Teal'c together hadn't been strong enough to so much as phase Belos—what could Daniel do against him alone, particularly as weak and hurt as he was?

Belos turned his back on Daniel and approached Jack menacingly. "Did you truly think to take my prize from me so easily? Did you truly think you could save him at all?"

Daniel moved again. Jack knew he had seen it that time, and he concentrated on keeping Belos talking. As Daniel pulled his arms up underneath him and started pushing himself up from the floor, Jack looked Belos directly in the eyes and said, "You've kept him alive this long. Where's the fun in killing him now?"

"I have kept him alive to amuse me," Belos answered. "While I waited, patiently, for you to return my new body to me. I never doubted that you would be returning. The fact that the other left with you was all the proof I needed of that."

Daniel had his feet beneath him and was starting to stand, slowly and awkwardly, as though he were having trouble controlling his own limbs. Or as though … as though he was being controlled by something, or some_one, _that wasn't used to controlling him.

The other Daniel hadn't disappeared. He'd merged himself with theirs.

Jack had to hide the smile that threatened to creep across his face, and he glanced at Sam and Teal'c to make certain they were seeing what he was. The looks in their eyes convinced him that they were, and he turned back to Belos once more.

"That body doesn't belong to you," Jack said.

"Not yet," Belos answered. "But it has always been meant to, and it soon will."

"No," Daniel's voice argued. "It was never supposed to, and it never will again."

For the briefest of seconds, Belos' face showed his surprise, but he'd wiped it away and replaced it with a carefully constructed air of boredom before he'd turned to fully face a now upright, steady, and faintly glowing Daniel Jackson.

"You have tried this before, young one," Belos said with a smile. "It has never worked."

Daniel lifted his chin and stood straighter, his eyes hard and defiant. "Oh, but this time it will work, Belos, because I've got something the others never had. I know something that they never knew."

"What is that, little one?"

Daniel smiled back at Belos—a cold, calculating, malevolent smile that Jack thought he'd never see on that face.

"We have to do it together," Daniel answered. "Or we can't do it at all!"

As the last word crossed his lips, Daniel thrust his arms out to his sides with his palms facing up toward the ceiling. He threw his head back and closed his eyes.

And screamed.

A blinding flash of light filled the room. Jack, Sam and Teal'c closed their eyes and turned their heads away, but the brightness burned through their eyelids. It was less than a second before the flash had faded away, but it seemed to Jack that the room was still brighter than it had been before. He opened his eyes and blinked away the last remnants of the flash, and he saw why.

The room was filled with thousands of energy clouds, each burning with an intense white light. Jack, Sam and Teal'c looked on in awe as Daniel raised his arms above his head, and the clouds danced around him, seemingly at his command.

Belos roared in anger.

"You can defeat one of us," Daniel said. "But you cannot possibly defeat all of us. It's time for you to see the true power that you've been chasing for the past four thousand years—the power that you could never achieve for yourself, but that you gave to us."

Daniel let his arms fall to his sides, and the energy clouds flew toward Belos. They surrounded him and swarmed around him; lightning danced between them and arched out toward him. Belos roared again, this time in pain and frustration. Jack could see the small burn marks that appeared on Belos everywhere the clouds struck him with their energy. He began to believe, once again, that his team would survive.

He looked directly into Belos' eyes only to realize that the alien was staring back at him, with eyes narrowed in hatred. "Your words were truth, O'Neill. I will kill you all. But I will start with you!"

Jack felt an invisible hand wrap around his throat. He opened his mouth to yell out a protest, but before he could the invisible fingers had tightened, stealing his breath and his voice. His arms fought against the restraints that held him to the wall; he wanted nothing more than to pry those choking fingers away from his throat so he could breathe again, but his struggles were useless.

"Belos!" he heard Daniel cry out. "Leave him alone!"

Jack's vision was starting to darken around the edges. He was losing this battle, and he was losing it quickly. His ears were muffled, as though he were underwater. His lips were numb, his head felt as though it were going to explode, and his lungs were screaming for air. He struggled harder against the restraints, knowing that he was wasting what precious little oxygen he had left but too far gone to stop himself.

"Damn you!" Daniel screamed. "Not again!"

Jack didn't know if he'd actually seen what he thought he saw, or if his oxygen-starved brain was hallucinating, but he could have sworn that lightning flew out of Daniel's fingers.

The fingers around his throat disappeared, and Jack drew a ragged, heaving breath. His ears opened back up enough that he could hear Sam and Teal'c yelling his name, and he wondered how long they'd been doing that. From the hoarseness of their voices, it had been quite a long while.

Jack opened his eyes slowly and blinked at the scene before him. The multitudinous energy clouds had retreated to the corners of the ceiling, and Belos was lying sprawled on the floor with a positively livid Daniel Jackson standing over him. Daniel was breathing heavily, his shoulders rising and falling rapidly. His face was flushed with anger and exertion. Small bolts of lightning still danced randomly across the ends of his fingers.

"Let them go," Daniel ordered, his voice low and haggard. "Now!"

Jack barely had time to register the words before the invisible restraints vanished as quickly as the fingers had, and he found himself crashing to the floor. He bent his knees just before his feet landed on the stone and threw himself into a roll to absorb the brunt of the impact. He looked to his right quickly and saw Teal'c and Sam descending in much the same way.

"Sir, are you all right?" Sam was on her feet and heading toward him before he'd even gotten back to his knees; Teal'c was right on her heels.

"O'Neill?"

"Fi …" Jack was shocked at how weak his voice sounded. He took a deep breath, thrilled to be able to do so, and cleared his throat. "I'm fine," he replied. He was still a bit hoarse, but it was better than the alternative.

"Jack?" Daniel called across his shoulder. "You okay?"

"Yeah," he answered. "You?"

In response, Daniel took two steps back from where he was standing. Sam gasped when she saw another Daniel, their Daniel, lying on the floor at his feet. At some point during the confusion, they had apparently separated again.

Jack was running forward before he ever realized he was moving, and Sam and Teal'c were right behind him. Jack fell to his knees at Daniel's side and rolled him over gently. Even if he hadn't known from across the room that this was their Daniel, the slashed face and chest would have made it obvious.

"What happened to him?" Jack demanded of the other Daniel, looking up.

The other Daniel looked back down at theirs sadly. "He took control when Belos threatened you. He shouldn't have been strong enough to do that, but I … I couldn't stop him. He was so weak to begin with, and attacking Belos like that …" he broke off and looked Jack directly in the eye. "It took everything he had left, Jack. I couldn't stop him."

"He did that for me?" Jack asked incredulously. He looked down once more at Daniel's battered face, and then up to Sam and Teal'c. "No … he did that for _us_. He saved us. All by himself. Didn't he?"

The other Daniel nodded. "He did the one thing that none of the rest of us have ever been able to do."

A moan pulled their attention back to their Daniel again. Jack leaned forward and placed his hand against the side of Daniel's face. He was completely focused on Daniel, but he couldn't help but notice how _right_ the contact felt. How had he not realized that the Daniel they'd had at the SGC had felt completely wrong?

"Daniel?" he said quietly. "You with us?"

Daniel's eyes fluttered a few times before opening slowly. The blue eyes were cloudy and unfocused, and he blinked.

"We're right here, Daniel," Sam said as she knelt at his other side. She reached out and wrapped her hand around his upper arm, biting back the tears that she felt forming in her eyes. How long had it been since she'd been able to do something so simple, so ordinary, as touch Daniel's arm?

Teal'c looked down at his teammates on the floor. He saw that Jack and Sam were somehow affected by their ability to touch Daniel, but there was more to it than that. Daniel was drawing all of his strength from them. The other had said that Daniel had nothing left; the other was wrong.

Daniel had them.

Without another thought, Teal'c knelt beside Jack and grasped Daniel's hand firmly. "We are united, Daniel Jackson."

Daniel blinked once more, drew a ragged breath, and finally focused on the faces around him. "You're okay," he breathed.

"Thanks to you," Jack answered. "How'd you do that?"

Daniel looked from Jack to Sam to Teal'c, as though he were only just realizing that they were there. He couldn't help but smile at the feeling of safety and security that came over him. Belos hadn't killed them—the nightmare wasn't going to come true—and he wasn't alone any more.

"I don't … I don't know," he answered truthfully. "I just did it."

"Can you sit up, Daniel?" Sam asked.

"Um … yeah, I think so."

Daniel tried to lift himself up, but found that he didn't have to work very hard. Teal'c's grasp on his hand tightened, Sam's hands gripped his arms firmly, and Jack's arm was suddenly behind his shoulders. Together, they managed to lift him into a sitting position and then, slowly, back to his feet again.

Teal'c glanced back down at Belos, where he still lay on the floor, and saw the Unas' form begin to stir. "O'Neill!" he said urgently. "Belos appears to be waking. We must leave this place."

Jack turned to look behind him, and was not surprised to see the other Daniel had stepped between them and the fallen Goa'uld. The energy clouds had descended once more, hovering right above the other Daniel's shoulders.

"What do we do now?" Jack asked him.

The other Daniel didn't turn around, didn't move his head, didn't remove his attention from Belos.

"You take Daniel and run," he answered.

"What about you?" Jack asked.

Daniel turned his head, looked Jack straight in the eye, and spoke very slowly and very carefully. "Take Daniel and run."

They took Daniel and ran.


	20. Chapter 20

- - -

Chapter Twenty

- - -

They were almost there.

Jack saw their bodies lying just ahead with Janet, her medical team, SG-2 and SG-3 surrounding them. Beside him, Daniel stumbled and fell to the ground. As Jack knelt down to help him back to his feet, he called out to Sam.

"Carter! Go! Tell Fraiser we're coming!"

With Jack's help, Daniel regained his footing and started running again. "Almost there, Daniel. Just a little bit further."

Daniel nodded as he ran, gasping for breath. He stumbled again; Jack's grip tightened around his upper arm and kept him from toppling over.

Jack felt a strong hand on his own arm and jerked his head around. "Do you require assistance with Daniel Jackson, O'Neill?"

Jack shook his head. "Nah, we're good. You go on ahead; tell Makepeace and Ferretti to stand ready."

Teal'c nodded wordlessly and, with one last glance at Daniel, sprinted ahead.

- - -

Sam bolted upright from the floor immediately after having re-entered her body. She felt a hand on her arm and spun to face the person kneeling beside her.

"Captain?"

"They're coming, Doc. They're right behind me."

- - -

Daniel lost his balance once more and even Jack's grasp couldn't keep him upright. He fell heavily to the floor, gasping and exhausted. He felt the palm of Jack's hand against his back as the man knelt beside him.

"Come on, Danny. Just a little more."

"I can't," Daniel managed to say between shuddering breaths. He closed his eyes in defeat. "You … you go. I can't … can't make it."

"Oh, yes you can," Jack responded. He wrapped his arms around the younger man's chest and hauled him to his feet. "You have to."

"Jack …"

"No way in hell did we go through all this just to have you give up now!"

A roar swelled up behind them, and both men jerked their heads toward the sound.

"He's coming," Daniel whispered, his eyes wide with fear. "Oh, God, he got away from them."

Jack grabbed the back of Daniel's jacket in his fist and shoved the archeologist forward. "Don't just stand there! Run!"

They had only made it a few feet when a bright light flashed directly in front of them. The two men skidded to a halt, blinking to clear their eyes of temporary blindness. They stood frozen, watching as something began to take shape before them. Light turned to shadow, and shadow formed the outline of the monster that was Belos. As they stared at the rapidly-solidifying form, they heard Teal'c's voice calling from far away.

"O'Neill!"

- - -

"Daniel Jackson!"

"Teal'c?" Dr. Fraiser appeared at his side before Teal'c even realized he'd returned to his body, reaching out for his arm to check his pulse.

Teal'c pulled away easily and turned his attention to the Marines that stood along the wall. "Colonel Makepeace, you are to prepare to detonate the charges around the symbol that we indicated. Everyone must move away from the wall."

"Teal'c?" He turned his head toward the voice, acknowledging Sam with a brief nod while again shrugging his wrist from Fraiser's grasp. "Teal'c, where are they? What's happening to them?"

Teal'c turned toward her in surprise, taking note of the red-rimmed eyes and the frantic glances she threw around the room. "Captain Carter?"

"I can't … I can't see them any more, Teal'c. I haven't been able to since I woke up. Can you?"

Teal'c looked directly at where he knew his two teammates to be, but he saw nothing. He pushed himself to his feet slowly and pulled his arm out of Fraiser's hands once more. His mouth fell open and he turned back to Sam.

"I cannot," he admitted.

"Teal'c, what are we going to do? We were supposed to stay together. We can't help them now!"

Teal'c nodded his head gravely. "O'Neill and Daniel Jackson are strong, Captain Carter. We must trust that they will help each other return."

A bright flash of light flooded the room, and everyone covered their eyes. A low, deep roar seemed to well up from the temple floor, rising in pitch and volume until the temple walls shook and dust rained down around the heads of those assembled in the room.

Teal'c grabbed his staff weapon and reached out with his left arm to push Dr. Fraiser behind him. Carter stood at the ready by his side, her own gun raised in anticipation.

"Teal'c, what is it? What's happening?"

"Belos is here."

- - -

Jack's eyes darted back and forth between Daniel's pale face and the hazy shape in front of them. He refused to believe that they had come so far, through so much, only to be stopped a few scant feet from success. And yet there they were, less than a yard from their bodies, with Belos blocking their path. Jack watched as the shadow wavered, rippling from the inside out, as the alien slowly retook shape … retook shape? It couldn't be possible, could it?

"He's not solid yet."

Jack turned to Daniel, not surprised to hear him voicing his thoughts, but surprised by the smirk on his face, which Jack returned quickly. He squeezed Daniel's shoulder once, asking if they could actually do this while at the same time giving reassurance that they could. Daniel nodded, and closed his eyes. A heartbeat passed, and his eyes were open and focused on the goal that lay just behind the shadow.

A silent three-count later, Jack tucked his head to his chest and bolted forward, pulling Daniel with him by his jacket. The jolt of energy that raced through them burned like liquid fire racing through their veins. Stabbing pain seared into their heads, darkening their vision and weakening their limbs. Jack shoved Daniel ahead of him as hard as he could, trying to keep himself between the younger man and the bellowing alien. Both men were screaming in agony when they hit the floor.

Jack rolled to his back the second he hit the ground, and realized that they had made it. He was staring directly into the glowing eyes of an almost completely solid Belos—who now stood behind them. Jack cast a frantic glance back over his shoulder to where Daniel had fallen. The archeologist lay completely still, face down, less than six inches from his body.

"You will pay for this insolence!" Belos roared.

"Bite me, snakehead!" Jack hissed in response, throwing himself toward Daniel even as he spoke. He grabbed Daniel's arm and shoved his friend forward, taking only a second to watch the consciousness slam back into the lifeless body. Smiling to himself, satisfied that Daniel had made it back, Jack ducked his head and rolled frantically in the other direction.

The last thing he saw as his consciousness settled back into his own body was the floor of the temple exploding as a shockwave pounded into the area between him and Daniel, a space he himself had occupied only half a second before.

- - -

"Cover!" Jack lurched into consciousness and flung himself to his right, covering his head with his arms to protect it from the debris that erupted from the floor.

Teal'c fell to his knees and pulled Janet down with him, spinning to his left as they went down. He drew the doctor against his chest and wrapped his arms around her, his broad back serving to shield her from the flying rock. Sam threw herself to the ground at the same instant, draping her upper body across Daniel's chest and face to protect him from the onslaught. Makepeace, Ferretti, their men and the medics turned toward the walls and threw their arms up or pulled their jackets over their heads.

"O'Neill!" Makepeace called through the settling dust and debris. "Now?"

"No!" Jack yelled out, pushing himself to his feet. "Not until we know Daniel's back!" He stumbled to Daniel's side and fell to his knees, nodding quickly at the three people already assembled across from him. He studied Daniel's face for signs of waking—fluttering eyelids, hesitant attempts at breath, twitching muscles in his jaw—anything that would indicate that he'd returned to his body.

He didn't see anything.

"Doc?" he asked, barely controlling his panic as he looked up at her. "Anything?"

Janet looked up from the portable monitors and shook her head slowly. "Nothing yet, sir. I'm …"

"You have failed, O'Neill!"

Jack pounded his fists against the stone floor when the voice echoed through the room, and he spun toward it.

"Damn you!" he growled. "He's back! I know he's back; I put him there myself!"

"Are you certain of this?" Belos' voice asked. A shadow across the room wavered and began to take shape. Strengthened by the nearness to the glyph that was the source of his power, Belos was able to project his consciousness into the physical plane.

Jack heard Janet gasp behind him as she got her first real look at an Unas.

"Positive!" Jack snapped back.

"Then why have you not ordered your men to detonate your crude explosives?" Belos continued. "If you are so certain of your victory, then why do you hesitate to destroy the device? Could it be that you fear doing so would trap him here forever? With me?"

Jack heard Teal'c's low growl behind him, and he sensed that Sam was rising to her feet, but he waved them both down when a thought occurred to him. He turned back toward Belos with a small smile on his face.

"One consciousness per body," he said. "If he weren't in there, then you would be. And you're not." Jack's smile grew wider when he saw the anger in Belos' eyes growing.

"Game's over, snakehead. You lose."

"Colonel!" Dr. Fraiser called from behind him. "Colonel, he's triggering the vent! He's trying to breathe on his own!"

Jack spun back around and for the second time in two minutes, he called out, "Cover!" When he was satisfied that everyone was as protected from the coming blast as they could be, he draped his upper body across Daniel's, looked up, and locked eyes with Robert Makepeace.

"Blow the damn thing!"

All hell broke loose.

Makepeace thumbed the detonator switch, and the C4 they had placed on the glyph exploded, taking with it a huge chunk of the wall. More shards of stone and dust rained down on the people huddled in the opposite corner. They scrambled for cover, and sounds of coughing filled the air as the last echoing of the blast faded from Jack's ears.

He heard Janet cursing loudly above him and he pushed himself up on his arms—he froze when he saw the blood that covered them. He looked down slowly and saw more blood on his chest. He jerked upright on his knees and searched himself for signs of injury. He realized almost immediately that he wasn't hurt. That was followed by a dreadful knowledge of where the blood had to have come from, and then he let himself hear what Fraiser was actually shouting.

"He's bleeding out!"

As if the sight of Daniel's previously bloodless gashes pouring blood down his face and bare chest weren't enough, Jack heard Belos' laughter echoing in the shattered remains of what had once been a peaceful sanctuary.

"No, O'Neill, you lose!"

"No!" Daniel's voice answered.

Jack spun toward the sound, which had come not from the floor in front of him, but from the other side of the room. The other Daniel stood there, on the opposite side of the destroyed wall, looking much worse than he had when Jack had last seen him. It was apparent that their last confrontation hadn't gone in his favor.

Nor had the explosion gone in theirs, Jack realized with a sinking heart. The wall was destroyed everywhere except underneath and behind the glyph, which was beginning to glow once more.

Belos laughed again. "Back for more, child?"

"Back for you," Daniel answered. "To send you back to hell!"

Daniel raised his hands toward the back of the glyph just as the beam began to emanate from it. The remaining energy clouds, which had been hovering around his head, sank into him, and Daniel stood straighter. From his fingertips came not lightning, but the energy that the clouds were feeding into him.

The beam froze in place, and began to sink back into itself. The energy from Daniel's hands surrounded what was left of the beam and pulled it back further, closer to the glyph.

Belos roared and ran toward him.

Daniel's eyes flashed with both hatred and determination, and the power that he commanded intensified. The walls and floor began to shake, and the glyph's glow began to fade.

Daniel looked up at the rapidly approaching Belos and smiled.

"I was never meant to be yours!" he cried triumphantly. "And I never will be again!"

The room was completely silent, as if time had frozen for the slightest fraction of a heartbeat.

Then the glyph imploded.

A great wind came from where the glyph had been, and a growing blackness spread across the room. It left the humans that were scattered about the room untouched and headed directly for Belos, who screamed in agony when it reached him.

The wind began to tear at him, the blackness began to pull, and Belos began to fall apart. To Jack, it looked as though the Goa'uld's very molecules were being shredded and dragged in a thousand different directions.

Belos screamed once more as the darkness erupted from his chest. Jack had to close his eyes against the blast, but they were closed only for a second.

When he opened them again, Belos was gone.

So was the other Daniel.

Jack didn't even have time to contemplate the meaning of those two things before he heard the frantic shouting behind him.

"No, Daniel, leave it! You still need that!"

"You've got to hold him still! Where are those damn pressure dressings? Someone hang that O-neg!"

"You must calm yourself, Daniel Jackson. You are seriously injured."

Jack turned back around and almost immediately regretted doing so. Daniel's face and chest were still pouring blood freely, despite Janet's best efforts at stopping them. His eyes were wide open and darting around the room in a panic. Teal'c was trying to hold him steady on the stretcher, but Daniel struggled to pull away from him. Sam was trying to protect the vent tube that ran down his throat, but Daniel kept knocking her hands away, apparently determined to take it out himself.

Jack grabbed for Daniel's flailing hand to help them keep him still, but one look at Daniel's eyes stopped him.

Daniel wanted—no, Daniel needed—to breathe on his own. He was dying, bleeding to death on the filthy floor of a temple they'd destroyed in a vain effort to save him, and Jack knew it. What was worse, Daniel knew it, too. Daniel didn't want the last breath he drew to be forced into his lungs by a machine. Just as before, the only person who could give him the death he wanted, the death he deserved, was Jack. But unlike before, Jack felt no hesitation when it came to acting on Daniel's wishes.

Jack grabbed Sam's hand, pulled it away from the tube, and motioned for Teal'c to let go his hold on Daniel's shoulders.

"Colonel!" Janet cried out.

"What are you doing?" Sam demanded.

"Let him do this," Jack answered softly. "Let him breathe."

Daniel wrapped his hand around the tube and pulled as hard as he could, but he couldn't dislodge it. Faced with two impossible choices, neither of which would affect the outcome at all, Jack did the only thing he could. He wrapped his free hand around Daniel's and helped him take the tube out.

"Colonel O'Neill!" Janet yelled again, in indignation. "What in the hell do you think you're doing!"

Jack looked down at the tube in his hand as Daniel's fingers loosened and his hand fell limply to the floor. This tube had kept Daniel's lungs working for two days, and for those two days, Jack had done everything in his power to keep it in place. When he saw it now, it was nothing more than a sign of their failure, and he threw it aside, disgusted by it.

They had failed.

Everything they'd done, everything they'd been through, everything that had happened … and Daniel was still going to die. They hadn't saved him from anything; they'd simply delivered him from a painless death to an agonizing one. He was bleeding to death, his broken ribs and fractured sternum were compressing his heart and lungs, and he had two bullet holes in him. What the hell did it really matter if he wanted to breathe on his own for the last few minutes of his life?

Jack refused to answer the angry questions the doctor and his second-in-command were hurling at him, and he ignored the silent anger that Teal'c was radiating. He looked down at the floor, at the limp hand lying there, and he grabbed it. Jack hooked his thumb around Daniel's, wrapped his fingers around the outside of Daniel's hand, and squeezed it as hard as he dared. He forced himself to ignore how cold the skin already was.

"Thank … you," Daniel gasped.

Jack forced himself to smile through the wetness forming in his eyes, but he didn't look away from the hand he held so tightly. "Any time," he answered. His attempt at calm and casual was foiled by his own shaking voice.

"No … Jack …"

Jack looked up, forcing himself to ignore the blood, making himself see only Daniel lying there, imagining him whole and healthy again.

"Thank you … for every … everything …"

Jack refused to look away, no matter how much he wanted to. He refused to close his eyes, no matter how badly he longed not to watch what he knew was happening. He'd refused to abandon Daniel when everyone else thought he was dead—he'd be damned if he would abandon him now. That didn't mean he could trust himself to speak, so he didn't. He kept his eyes locked with Daniel's and only nodded his head.

"S … Sam …"

"Right here, Daniel," Sam answered quickly. Jack felt her take Daniel's other hand in hers and hold it against her chest. Jack stole only a quick glance across at her, but he saw the anger on her face fall away and be replaced by understanding. She knew now why Daniel had wanted that tube out so badly. If he couldn't breathe on his own, he couldn't talk.

If he couldn't talk, he couldn't tell them goodbye.

"Oh, Daniel!" Sam closed her eyes, pressed Daniel's hand against her lips, and kissed it softly. "I'm so sorry! We're so sorry!"

"No …" Daniel whispered to her. He brushed his fingers across her cheek lightly, wiping her tears away. "Don't … don't be. Saved … saved me …" he insisted.

"We saved you from nothing, Daniel Jackson," Teal'c said. His large hand came to rest against the side of Daniel's face, and Daniel looked up into normally emotionless brown eyes that were filled with pain. "We failed you."

Daniel shook his head weakly. "Some things, Teal'c … worse than … death …"

Janet remained on her knees at Daniel's side. The doctor in her was screaming at her to do something, to save him, but she knew there was nothing she could do. She wanted to touch him, to comfort him, to tell him her own goodbyes, but she knew that she would be intruding. She settled for letting her head fall back and staring up at the ceiling.

She was the only one who saw the bright white energy cloud that hovered directly above them. She tilted her head and wondered what it was, until she heard Daniel's weak voice again.

"C … c … cold …"

Jack squeezed Daniel's hand harder in his and pressed it to his chest, tight against his heart, exactly as Sam was doing.

"Almost over now, Daniel," he said softly, neither noticing nor caring that tears were sliding down his face. "It'll all be okay soon."

"T … tire … ired …"

"Close your eyes, Daniel," Sam urged, fighting back her sobs and failing miserably. "Just go to sleep."

"Let it come, Daniel Jackson," Teal'c whispered. "Be at peace."

Daniel's eyes drifted closed. Sam closed her eyes and turned away; Teal'c bowed his head. Jack refused to look away, vowing to keep his eyes on Daniel's face until the end.

Only Janet saw the white cloud lowering toward them; only Janet saw the long, gentle arms that waved beneath it; only Janet saw those arms reaching for Daniel's chest.

Everyone in the temple heard Daniel's gasped breath and saw his back arch up from the floor. To the rest of the occupants of the sanctuary, who had been standing in stunned silence, it looked as though Daniel Jackson's body had finally given up the fight, and his soul had gone from this life into the next.

To the members of SG-1, who felt his hands squeeze theirs tightly and who watched the wounds on his body slowly fade away into nothing, it was Daniel Jackson's triumphant return to the land of the living.

Jack, Sam and Teal'c stared at each other in shock, and then down at Daniel, whose eyes were opening again. Jack wiped at the blood on Daniel's chest with his hands frantically, almost afraid to let himself believe what he was seeing, and he glanced up to see Teal'c doing the same with his face. The blood parted to reveal only firm, unmarred flesh underneath. Teal'c and Jack looked up at each other and shared small, awe-filled smiles. Sam pulled the bandage away from his shoulder wound—it was gone too. Daniel lifted his head slightly and looked down at himself; he lifted his left hand to touch his chest in disbelief.

He didn't have a scratch on him.

Daniel's breathing was even and normal; his eyes were open and focused. There was no more pain in those eyes, or on that face.

Daniel was alive, and he was smiling.

"Hey, guys," he said.

The joy they felt almost overwhelmed them, and they all fell forward slightly, laughing and smiling and crying all at the same time. Daniel tried to push himself up and, just as before, found that he had three people very willing to help him do it. They sat there for a few moments, just smiling at each other.

It was Jack who finally asked the question all three of them had spinning in their brains.

"What just happened?"

"I think I … just saved myself."

Jack turned away from his celebrating team and glanced up at the ceiling just in time to see the pure white energy cloud fade away into nothingness. "Thank you, Daniel," he whispered. "For everything."

"Jack?"

He turned back when he heard Daniel call his name softly.

"Jack, what are you doing?"

Jack smiled. "Just thanking a friend for … keeping his promise."

"What promise was that, sir?" Sam asked.

Jack thought about it for a second and then answered honestly. "He promised to save us, Carter." He couldn't stop himself from grasping Daniel's arm tightly when he said, "He promised he'd save us all."

Teal'c and Sam smiled softly at each other, and Jack nodded his head at them.

Daniel smiled broadly and promptly passed out.


	21. Chapter 21

- = - = -

Chapter Twenty-One

- = - = -

Daniel sat on the edge of his bed in the infirmary, swinging his legs back and forth absently. Every now and then, his legs would swing harder than he expected, and his calf would collide painfully with the bottom of the dropped bed rail. He didn't mind it much though. After two days of having everything he touched, and everything that touched him, feel like a dream, the occasional bump or bruise was a welcome reminder that he was solid once again.

The pain he'd felt on the planet was nothing but a distant, fading memory. Whatever the other version of him had done had been remarkably effective—even his headache was finally gone.

After he'd awoken, still on his stretcher, on the way back to the Stargate, he and Sam had found time to have a short discussion about their new-found abilities to have out-of-body experiences at will. Sam told him that she and Teal'c had both lost their abilities to see their non-corporeal teammates after they'd returned to their bodies on the planet. Daniel figured that if he could still leave his body while unconscious, he'd have done so after he'd passed out. They'd almost concluded that returning to their bodies in the proximity of the glyph had acted as an "off switch" of sorts, just as the beam had turned the ability on in the first place, when Jack had interrupted.

"Don't make me separate you two!" he'd said in a mock-parental voice. "You don't want me to stop this stretcher!"

The memory made Daniel smile, and he glanced across at the bed opposite him, where Jack and Sam were sitting with Teal'c standing behind them. The three of them had come to the infirmary with him to keep him company. At least, that's what they had told Janet and General Hammond they were going to do. But they'd been in the infirmary for nearly an hour, and none of them had said a word to him.

Every time he'd looked across at them, they were just looking at him and smiling.

"Okay, what?" he finally asked.

"What what?" Jack returned casually.

"What?" Daniel asked again. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Like what?" Jack asked.

"Like that!" Daniel insisted. "Like I'm going to disappear or something."

Sam smiled. "Maybe because we're glad that you won't."

"Oh!" Daniel exclaimed in sudden understanding. He nodded his head and looked toward the wall. "Oh, yeah."

Jack chuckled lightly and shook his head. "We just wanna make sure you aren't gonna start doing that glowy thing again."

Daniel shook his head quickly. "No. No more glowy thing. I don't know how I did it in the first place."

"So, do you remember how to do that lightning from the fingertips thing?" Jack asked with a grin.

Daniel shook his head again. "Nope."

"Too bad," Jack said. "That might have come in handy some day."

A few moments of silence passed before Teal'c spoke.

"I wonder what became of the other souls trapped within the temple."

Daniel shook his head sadly. "I don't know. Aynad died before you came back, trying to protect me from Belos. And it looked like a lot of them didn't survive the first two fights with Belos. There were a lot less of them with him when he …"

Jack heard the quiet despair in Daniel's voice. He stood, walked to Daniel's bed, and sat down beside him.

"Hey," he said softly. "He saved you, right? So he couldn't have died when he destroyed Belos. He's still gotta be out there, somewhere." Jack knew that his words held no truth. He himself had watched the other Daniel disappear after he'd healed theirs. But still, Jack wanted to hold out hope that somehow, some way, he'd managed to survive. Maybe he hadn't been _their_ Daniel Jackson, but he had been Daniel Jackson, after all.

"No, he's gone. I mean, I knew it was going to happen, it's just …"

"Just what?" Sam asked.

"If I survived, he'd cease to exist," Daniel answered. "He knew that from the very beginning. He did it anyway."

"Would you not give your life to save the life of a stranger, Daniel Jackson?" Teal'c asked.

"Of course," Daniel answered without hesitation.

"And would you not do the same to save your own?"

Daniel couldn't argue with Teal'c's logic. He smiled and nodded.

The sound of rapidly approaching footsteps cut through the silence and announced Janet's return. "All right, Dr. Jackson. Everything looks good. Your heart and lungs are functioning perfectly on their own, and that alone is a vast improvement over this morning."

Janet flashed a large smile in his direction. Daniel felt the warmth rush to his cheeks, and he looked down at his feet.

"Blood work is good," Janet continued, still grinning. "All of your counts are right where they're supposed to be. No damage from the gunshot wounds, no sign of nerve damage, and not a hint of those broken ribs and sternum. Your EEG is almost back to normal—just a few minor fluctuations here and there. I'm guessing that those will work themselves out in a few days, but I'll want you back for a follow-up in forty-eight hours just to make certain."

Daniel nodded.

"I'm going to go ahead and release you, but there will be some conditions."

"Like what?"

"For starters, I don't want you driving. No caffeine." Janet ignored the groan of protest. "And I'd like you to stay on base until that follow-up."

"So that's it?" Sam asked.

"That's it," Janet answered.

"What about him passing out on the planet?" Jack asked. "That's not a problem?"

Janet smiled and shook her head. When she noticed Daniel trying to stifle a yawn, she gestured at him.

"That was exhaustion, Colonel. He just needs a good ten hours or so of sleep."

Jack looked at Daniel in surprise. "How can you possibly be tired?" he asked. "You've spent the past two days in bed."

"My body spent the past two days in bed," Daniel corrected. "I didn't."

"So we're clear here, Daniel?" Janet asked. "You're going to go straight to your quarters and get some sleep."

Daniel didn't bother to hide the yawn; he simply covered his mouth with his hand and nodded.

"All right," Jack said as he hopped up. "Carter, Teal'c, you guys take sleepyhead here and start him toward his bunk. I'll catch up in a second."

Sam and Teal'c nodded and stepped forward. Daniel pushed himself to his feet, and together the three of them walked out into the corridor.

Jack turned back to Janet.

"You're sure he's okay? I mean, he's been through a lot in the past two days."

Janet smiled and nodded again. "He'll be fine after he gets some sleep. His mind's been through a lot in the past two days; his body hasn't."

Jack stared at her, incredulous. "Are you forgetting that we watched him bleed to death two hours ago?"

Janet shook her head sadly. "No, Colonel. I don't think I'll ever be able to forget that. But his body has forgotten what happened to it, and physically, he's perfectly fine. But between this and the whole mind probe thing last week, his mind needs some time to rest. And so does he. He's just emotionally and mentally exhausted, and the absolute worst that could happen is that he might be a little more open to suggestion than normal for the next few days."

Janet's smile returned, wider than before. "Actually, he is more open to it. I've already tried it out a few times. But if that means we'll actually be able to get him to do as he's told for a while, then it might not be a bad thing."

Jack smiled back at her. "Sneaky, Doc. I like it."

"I thought you might approve."

Jack nodded once more before he turned toward the door.

"Oh, Colonel, one more thing."

Jack stopped and turned back around.

"I'm going to put SG-1 on medical leave for two weeks, just to give you all enough time to recover fully from your … experience."

Jack's grin widened. "Thanks, Doc."

"You're very welcome, Colonel."

Jack left the infirmary at a jog. He maintained his pace until he caught up with the rest of his team.

"Good news, kids," he announced. "Doc's giving us all two weeks off."

Sam smiled; Teal'c nodded; Daniel groaned.

"Two weeks?" Daniel asked. "What are we supposed to do for two weeks?"

"Relax," Sam answered.

"Use the time to rest and recuperate," Teal'c suggested.

"Go fishing?"

"Jack, I'm not …"

"Dr. Jackson! Dr. Jackson!" The voice came from behind them. SG-1 turned to face the out-of-breath airman that was running down the corridor. "Dr. Jackson, thank God I found you!"

Jack shook his head vigorously. "Oh, no. Whatever it is will just have to wait. Dr. Jackson has an appointment with his bunk."

"Jack …"

"No." Jack took Daniel by the shoulders and started pushing him toward his quarters. Sam and Teal'c followed right behind him.

"But, Colonel …" the airman began.

"Whatever it is, the answer is no."

"But, sir!" the airman protested desperately. "General Hammond is waiting, sir!"

Jack froze so quickly that Sam walked into him.

"Sorry, sir," she muttered.

Daniel pulled away from Jack and turned to face the nearly frantic airman.

"General Hammond needs to see me?"

"Yes, sir."

"Why?" Daniel asked in confusion.

"You have a delivery, sir. In the gate room."

"A delivery in the gate room? Why on … how did … what is it?"

Jack sighed in frustration and let his arms fall to his sides. Oh yeah, was Daniel ever susceptible to suggestion. And now that his curiosity was piqued, there would be no getting him to sleep until he'd satisfied it.

With a gesture to Sam and Teal'c to follow, Jack took off after the now jogging Daniel Jackson. He and the airman had gotten so far ahead of the rest of SG-1 that Jack barely heard the airman's breathless answer.

"It's one of those Egyptian coffin things, sir. A great big gold one …"


End file.
